


Secret Chambers of the Heart

by HASA_Archivist



Series: The Dûnhebaid Cycle, by Adaneth [7]
Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: 3rd Age - The Stewards, Canon - Engaging gap-filler, Canon - Enhances original, Characters - Family Dynamics, Characters - Friendship, Characters - Strongly in character, Characters - Well-handled emotions, Drama, Plot - Can't stop reading, Subjects - Culture(s), Subjects - Economics, Subjects - Explores obscure facts, Subjects - Geography, Subjects - Medical/Healing, Subjects - Politics, Writing - Clear prose, Writing - Engaging style, Writing - Every word counts, Writing - Evocative, Writing - Well-handled PoV(s), Writing - Well-handled dialogue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-19
Updated: 2015-04-19
Packaged: 2018-03-24 20:00:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 53,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3782480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HASA_Archivist/pseuds/HASA_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dwarves seldom speak of what is in their hearts . . . but that doesn't mean there's nothing there but a lust for gold.  The Dûnhebaid Cycle, Part VI.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Longest Day

**Author's Note:**

> Note from the HASA Transition Team: This story was originally archived at [HASA](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Henneth_Ann%C3%BBn_Story_Archive), which closed in February 2015. To preserve the archive, we began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in February 2015. We posted announcements about the move, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this author, please contact The HASA Transition Team using the e-mail address on the [HASA collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/hasa/profile).

Forðon domgeorne     dreorigne oft  
in hyra breostcofan     bindað fæste;  
swa ic modsefan     minne sceolde,  
oft earmcearig,     eðle bidæled,  
freomægum feor     feterum sælan,  
siþþan geara iu     goldwine minne  
hrusan heolstre biwrah,     ond ic hean þonan  
wod wintercearig     ofer waþema gebind,  
sohte seledreorg     sinces bryttan,  
hwær ic feor oþþe neah      findan meahte  
þone þe in meoduhealle     mine wisse,  
oþþe mec freondleasne     frefran wolde,  
wenian mid wynnum.

__ Therefore those desiring reputation  
__ often shut up sorrow in the casket of their breast.  
__ So I have had to fetter fast my heart—  
__ often wretched, deprived of homeland  
__ and far from noble kin—  
__ since years ago my gold-giving lord  
__ in earth's hiding-place I covered.  
__ And thence, distressed, desolate as winter, I went  
__ over the waves, sadly bereft of hall,  
__ seeking one who might bestow treasure;  
__ if I can find, far or near, one who, in his mead-hall,  
__ would know of my mine own folk,  
_ or comfort my friendlessness  
_ __ with winning custom.

—Anonymous, "The Wanderer"

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

The deep din of a close-packed hall was pleasant to Grimr's ear: it was long since he had sat down to the Noontide Feast under a mansion's roof, and the rumbling babel brought back memories of Midsummer under the Mountain, when Dwarves and Dalemen had toasted one other, bumper after bumper, until long after the laggard sun had set.

Though there were no Men here; no Men, and neither kin nor friends of his at this Firebeard feast.  His neighbors at table, near the lowest in Sulûnduban's grand hall, were a charcoal burner who had not troubled to clean his black-rimmed nails and ate wolfishly, speaking little, and a pair of brothers, tinkers whose business was mostly in the Shire.

Grimr drained his stein, though the ale served to scroungers such as they was sour, the dregs of the cellars.  He had often had worse, yet it was another galling reminder of how cruelly his fortunes had fallen.  Heir to one of the great foundries of Erebor, eighty years ago he had been keenly piling up craft and gold against the day he and his beloved would wed.  They had slipped away from the Midsummer festivities to walk hand in hand through his father's deserted workshops, and she had given him a kiss, sweeter than the rich wine of Rhûn.

Half a life ago.  More than half his count of years, yet he had been left with less than half a life, bereft of spouse and children to put heart into his labors.  Would that he had been under the Mountain with Heilsa when the dragon came, rather than seeing to a cargo of ore from the Iron Hills in Laketown.  And now he was worse off than the threadbare tinkers beside him, for all the skill in his hands.  The northernmost lordling in the Hills of Twilight had not been content to cheat him of the fee for the mending of his ill-used sword, but had robbed him of pack pony and tools as well, crowing like a dunghill cock as his hounds ran Grimr off, baying and snapping at the hocks of his riding pony as it bolted.

He had cursed the Man, but that would not bring back his hammers and tongs, anvil and files, nor would the four crowns, three florins, and single groat in his purse, even with the two Erebor marks sewn into his bootsoles, replace them.  Long he had staved off this day, but he must choke down his pride and labor for another's profit, praying his luck would turn so he could earn enough to equip himself again.  A week it had taken him to reach Sulûnduban, the nearest place he knew folk of his kindred dwelt; a hard-riding, belt-tightening week of roots and berries and water from the burns.  Here he had found Raun, who was ashamed that he could spare little more than a blanket and a chair by his meager hearth, but Raun had introduced him to Onar, whose son Oski was prenticed to the gemsmith Veylin, one of the chieftains of the Firebeards.  Veylin was seeking an ironsmith who would not object to blacksmithing for Men, Oski had told him, filling his tankard with a generous hand; Men friendly to Dwarves, the lad added, as he scowled.

Were there Men friendly to Dwarves left in the world?  Grimr had begun to doubt it, for he had met none since he turned his back on the ruin of Dale.  Still, he could ill afford to spurn any opportunity and Oski spoke favorably of his master's generosity.  A chieftain ought to be great-hearted, and any gemsmith worthy of the occupation should be able to afford benevolence—the glimpse he had gotten, across the hall, gleamed and glittered enough: ruddy as autumnal bracken beside his king's golden hues; somewhat halt.

"Who is the lame one, on the dais by the king?" Grimr asked Skeggi, the more garrulous of the brothers.  Only a foolish prentice would speak ill of his master, but these two would carry any gossip and were Broadbeams to boot, no kind of kin to Veylin.

The tinker glanced that way, then went back to spreading dripping on his black bread.  "Veylin the Venturesome, chieftain of Thrir's line."

"The venturesome?"  That was a word like a sword, which might cut both ways.

"Aye," the other brother, Kaupi, affirmed, reaching for the pitcher.  "You have not heard of him?"

"No."

Skeggi sat back, regarding him with disbelief.  "How can that be?  Is he not renown from the mountains to the sea?"

"That may be so, but I have been long on the road."

The knowing look in the tinker's eye—no doubt he often used the excuse himself, when dealing with those fortunate enough to be settled in a delf—was offensive.  "Ah.  Then you have missed a good tale.  What would you give to hear it?"

Such chaffering asked for the jaded chuff Grimr gave.  "Little, if I can get it from any of my own folk for the asking.  Yesterday I was told one of us is prenticed to a gemsmith of that name.  Are there two Veylins among the Firebeards?"

The charcoal-burner snorted as he seized the last piece of bread.

"Do you tramp beyond the Brandywine?" Grimr asked, taking out his pipe.  "I can tell where you would find a welcome."

Skeggi shook his head dismissively.  "There is trade enough among the Beardfoots.  But a fill of pipe-weed would not go amiss."

Grimr stared at him, pouch in his hand.  "Surely there is no lack of pipe-weed in the Shire!"

The tinker glanced away, an unconvincing smile on his lips.  "Such prices they ask for it in springtime!  We always buy ours after the harvest."

When the Hobbits were keen to sell off the previous year's stock, as the fresh leaf cured.  That was still some months away, however.  Well, what else could he expect at these footling tables but the improvident and spendthrift?  Grimr weighed his pouch in his hand: he had not much left himself, but a pipeful of leaf was a fair price for a tale.  "Pass me your pipe, then, and tell me of this Veylin while we smoke."

"What would you know?" Skeggi asked, watching closely as Grimr packed the briar.

No doubt he wished he had the filling of its bowl, but Grimr did not stint him.  "What it is that has made him so renown.  Why is he called venturesome, and how did he come to be lame?"

"All that he has earned," Skeggi said, puffing to set the weed alight, "because he is not content to stay here among his own folk, though they hold him and his work in great esteem.  That splendid chain, which blazes on Regin's breast?" the tinker pointed out.  "That is by his hand."

"It looks very fine."  Not that they could see more than the gleam and glint from here, but surely Durin's brother would settle for none but the best.  "But what is to be gained, beyond wealth and honour among one's kin?"

"The gems that bring him both!" Kaupi declared, putting an elbow in his brother's ribs and taking the pipe from the hand flung in his direction.

"He has long traded with the Elves of the Havens," Skeggi harrumphed, scowling at his brother and snatching his own back after a few puffs.  "And having lost his dread of the sea, he began to prospect near the shore."

"Where he has got much treasure."

"Who made this bargain?" Skeggi cried, fending off his brother's attempt to take the pipe again.  "Get your own next time!"  Clenching his teeth on the stem, the tinker muttered, "Or so it is said.  Who can tell where the stones come from?  But it was by the sea he was lamed, and his friend and his prentice slain, by some water-loving kin of trolls."

Kaupi drowned his disappointment in the sour ale.  "He is not so lame he could not take vengeance on the creatures.  Storri says Bersi swears he slew the very one that killed Thekk."

"With the help of Men," Skeggi sniffed.  "Why do you accept Bersi's word?  He favors Veylin above his own kindred."

"If there are not riches at Gunduzahar, why has Bersi's wife joined him there?  And Veylin's own sister removed there as well?"

"Because she would keep her sons near their uncle, now that their father is dead."

"Why would she do that, if the profit did not outweigh the risk?  Besides, they will inherit from Rekk, who has his brother's share."

Gunduzahar was Veylin's delf across the mountains: a fine place, Oski had assured him, not too near the sea.  The company was but one shy of thirty, though pick had first been put to stone not three years before.  He had not mentioned the women, however.  "What is this of Men?" Grimr asked.  They provided Gunduzahar with fresh meat and some corn, according to Oski, and would give good measure for knives and harness buckles.

"The Men who dwelt in Birkidale were driven out by the troll-kin, and some took refuge by the sea, not far from Gunduzahar.  They are ruled by the sister of their slain lord, and—" Skeggi added, with the sly relish of gossip "—Veylin is very friendly with the Lady of White Cliffs, it is said."

More charitably, Kaupi allowed, "It is also said that she mended his leg, after the water-fiend shattered it."

"No wonder it is crooked," the charcoal-maker muttered, and went back to gnawing on his black crust.

It sounded very peculiar, even nonsensical, but what could more could be expected of rumour that had passed through so many mouths?  Still, there was little ill of Veylin in such report, save that he took risks and gained great profit thereby, and was more familiar with the women of Men than was usual in these unsettled lands, where Men guarded their families more closely than they had in the fair town of Dale.

As some began to clear the tables and benches away from the center of the hall to make room for entertainment and dancing, Grimr was glad of the opportunity to repay his hosts with labor, for it allowed him to distance himself from his less than congenial companions.  Holding the end of one table while waiting for the next to clear the way also allowed him a nearer look at Veylin.  Not too near, for the chieftain was seated between Balin and Glóin at the king's table and Grimr would rather not be noticed by the kinsmen of Thorin, but close enough to better assay his appearance.  His chain and jewels were magnificent, as a fine gemsmith's must be, and his garb equally rich, russet overlain with copper broidery and accents of a bluish green.  Grimr had never seen one of his rank favor copper over the noble metals, but it suited his coloring very well.  And though Glóin was but a youngster, he was attending his speech with more than polite interest.

If he must serve another, Grimr would rather it not be a haughty man, proud in descent but not deeds.  He had had enough of that.

The music and dancing whiled away the time pleasantly: the ale passed around among the throng was a sound, nutty brew and their hosts played many a Longbeard tune, in honor of Gróin and his companions.  Grimr kept an eye on the high table, however, not wanting to lose a chance to speak to Veylin.  If a shabby Longbeard petitioned at his door, would he get a hearing?  At best, he must wait until those with better claims on their chieftain's time had been seen, and that wait might be long, with the quarter sessions upon them, while he ate what was left of his money.

The water-clock had struck the third hour before Regin took leave of the revelers, wishing all great profit from the Midsummer Fair and a most prosperous summer; Gróin went with him.  Balin and Dwalin, Óin and Glóin, and Regin's two sons then came down from the dais to join in more frivolous amusements, and Grimr drifted nearer the door.  Yet the chieftain who had sat at Gróin's right hand, the one with emeralds in his chain, came and took Balin's seat beside Veylin, and they were deep in talk for so long Grimr began to mistrust his plan.  Foolish presumption, to accost a chieftain of another kindred on his way to his bed after a feast—what was he thinking?  All this ale had gone to his head.  Let him go back to Raun's and doss down before the fire, then petition in a more fitting fashion tomorrow.  Oski would speak on his behalf.  Though it might be that Veylin had already found a smith—any of the grandsons of Farin would suit, surely.

Grimr was looking for a place to leave his stein when movement on the dais caught his eye.  Veylin clapped his companion on the shoulder and slid his golden goblet towards him, then pushed himself up from table and took up a stick.  It was not a crutch: he stumped, stiffly but doughtily, towards the small door at the back of the dais.

The postern!  Why had he not spent his time considering where it might lead?  Plunking the stein down on the nearest bench, Grimr strode through the archway.  Since the door was not concealed, it was unlikely to lead directly to any of the lordly halls.  The king's household was above them; Veylin's halls, Oski had said, were in the First Deep.

Down the Great Stair he went, the few folk abroad looking askance at his hurry.

Yet when he reached the First Deep and gazed into the fine semicircular arcade, a fountain playing where three streets met, his heart misgave him once more.  Even if he found the chieftain here, would not his headlong desperation give a bad impression?

Everything he did turned to ill.

Grimr stood, hand on newel, overburdened by doubt.  What now?  The pattern of his life was broken; he felt like a houseless spirit, disconnected and alone.  Who here would profit or lose by either his presence or absence?  Who would care if he stayed or went?  Uselessness gnawed at him like rust.

Fearing now to be found lurking where he did not belong, yet unable to bear the descent to Raun's, where he was an imposition, Grimr turned and climbed slowly back up, not to the revelry in the Second Hall, but to the First, where a few keen souls were already setting up their counters for the Fair.  Might one of them want assistance?  He would not get much more than the price of a mug of coffee as a porter, but the work should drive the chill from his heart.  Pacing along the colonnade, he eyed the tradesmen, trying to judge who to approach.

The tap of metal on stone warned him of another's presence.  Halting in a pillar-shadow, Grimr peered ahead.  Where the light of the great lamps fell between the columns, benches were set along the wall, convenient for conversation, and on one sat Veylin, hands clasped on the head of his stick.

There was no mistaking that blaze of russet and copper.  Yet he wore a very different face than he had at the feast, joviality quenched, replaced by pensive dissatisfaction.

What cause could this splendid chieftain have for discontent, Grimr wondered, resentment rousing in his breast.  Had his pride been dunted by the chore of entertaining the younger Longbeards at the feast instead of their elders?  Perhaps he had seen a jewel he could not possess?

With a deep sigh, Veylin chafed his right knee and rose, leaning heavily on his stick; and when he moved towards the Great Stair, he went very lame indeed.

There were misfortunes in the world he had not suffered.  Ashamed of his bitterness and the sight of the man's weakness, Grimr slipped around the pillar and fell back, soft-footed, towards the Stair.  When he reached the last pillar, however, he paused, irresolute.  Where did he mean to go?  Was he not throwing away the opportunity he had so earnestly sought?

"Many thanks!" he called heartily towards one of the early tradesmen, who did not even look his way.  "May the Fair profit you!"  How foolish he felt, shouting at strangers in a delf he barely knew: but it served his purpose, for when Veylin emerged from the colonnade, his stick was loose in his hand and there was no pain in his eyes, only curiosity at the sight of a noisy fellow he did not know.

"Good evening," Veylin greeted him, very civilly.  "Or, I should say, good morning."

"And to you," Grimr replied, bowing and praying it was neither too little nor too low.  "Pardon," he asked, with a hesitation that was not in the least contrived, "but are you Veylin, Vali's son?"

"That is my name."  Those eyes, russet as his beard, grew more reserved, but not mistrustful.  "You are—?"

"Grimr, Linr's son, once of Erebor, at your service and your family's.  Or so I hope.  I spoke yesterday to my kinsmen, Onar and Oski, and Oski told me you are seeking an ironsmith for your company at Gunduzahar."

Directness did not offend him.  "I am.  How do you come to be seeking employment?"

A fair question, bluntness for bluntness.  "My goods and gear were stolen from me."

"By whom?"

Grimr clenched his jaw to restrain his bile.  "The lordling at Coldmouth."

Shifting his weight more onto his good leg, Veylin looked very grave.  "Oski told you I seek a smith who will work for Men?"

"There are Men and there are Men," Grimr declared.  "I liked those in Dale, and Oski speaks well of those near Gunduzahar."

That guarded face softened a little.  "They are the best I have ever met with."  Chewing on the ends of his whiskers, Veylin considered.  "You would not object to a trial of your smithcraft?"

"No."

"Where will a message find you?"

"I am staying with my kinsman Raun, who houses in the North Reach of the Fifth Deep."

Though such quarters did nothing for his reputation, the chieftain seemed indifferent.  "Look for a message, then, in a day or two.  Oh, can you shoe a horse?"

"A horse?  Not a pony?"

Veylin pursed his lips.  "Some of us keep our ponies shod, but the Men have asked particularly for a farrier.  One of their great strapping ploughbeasts has problems with its feet."

Grimr regarded the chieftain with narrowed eyes.  Was he trying to daunt him?  "I have shod carthorses once or thrice.  So long as there is a Man to hold the beast, I am willing."

That earned him a smile.  "Splendid!  I look forward to our next meeting, then."  Veylin bowed in leavetaking.  "May the Fair increase your fortune."

"Yours, no less."  When Grimr raised his head from his own bow, Veylin was already stumping towards the Stair.  A man of mettle, beyond doubt.  Though he would wager that the chieftain did not falter again until he was safe behind his own doors, Grimr turned away from the sight of his travail.

That had gone better than he dared imagine.  A proud Dwarf, yes, but not inclined to temper.  The pain of his leg would have justly excused ill will towards any who kept him standing, let alone an importuning stranger, yet he had given him a fair hearing.  That was what a chieftain ought to be.

How grievously the world was faulted, that he did not find such consideration among the chiefs of his own kindred, the dethroned heirs of the Eldest.  Bitterly they complained of how few still followed them, of those who had gone to the stripling Dáin or sought homes among Firebeards and Broadbeams, kin their fathers had abandoned ages ago for the wealth of Khazad-dûm.  They would say that of him, he was sure, though the fathers of his fathers were all born in Gundabad.  Did they reck those whose bones had been laid in the Misty Mountains, seeking Azog, or the multitude burned after Azanulbizar?

Bitterness.  Some was desirable in a weapon, to sharpen its edge—and there was a dragon to be slain—but too much and the blade would shatter, as likely to wound friend as foe.  Was it a sin to mistrust the temper of his king, Heir of the Deathless?

If so, he must pray Mahal would pardon him, for he could not be a dutiful son to so baleful a father.  Thorin had turned his hand to iron to reforge his fortunes: he would not brook rivalry in trade, but neither was he able to employ his own folk or place them where they might prosper.  Nor was such neglect new—his father and grandfather before him had abandoned their people to seek fortunes in the wilderness with a few boon companions only.  To what end?  Thrór was dead; and Thráin's companions, some of whom reveled in the feast hall above, had returned without him years since.  Should a like fate await Oakenshield, Grimr would not be in the least astonished.

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

This is the sixth story in the Dûnhebaid ("Westshores") cycle, which is set in northwestern Eriador during the mid-29th century of the Third Age of Middle-earth.  As explained in the author's notes for Dûnhebaid I: _Rock and Hawk_ , this cycle takes its sense of place from the West Highlands of Scotland.  In general, I prefer "Dark Age" (post-Roman, early medieval) models for the Mannish cultures of what was the Kingdom of Arnor, but this tale focuses on Dwarves, whose singular origins sets them and their culture apart from all others.

While I hope you can enjoy this story on its own merits, for the fullest appreciation of its characters and events I recommend reading the preceding parts of the cycle: _Rock and Hawk_ (T.A. 2847); _Fair Folk and Foul_ (T.A. 2848); _Of Like Passion_ and _After Stormy Seas_ (T.A. 2849); and _Hand to Hand_ (T.A. 2849–2850).

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Notes

**"The Wanderer"** : an Old English poem, which Tolkien knew well.  I have adapted this translation to suit my Dwarvish protagonists.

**Hills of Twilight** : Emyn Uial.

**"four crowns, three florins, and single groat in his purse, even with the two Erebor marks"** : this comes to two pounds, six shillings, and fourpence—which might buy you two tons of wheat (enough to feed ten people for a year) or 46 cows.  (See "Coinage" in the the [Dûnhebaid Dictionary](http://astele.co.uk/stories/chapter_view.cfm?stid=7676&SPOrdinal=1).)  That may seem plenty to re-equip a smith, but consider the quantity of iron (a hundredweight was worth one pound and eight shillings) and tool-steel (five times as expensive as iron) involved, let alone the skilled labor needed to produce even a basic set of tools.  Technology requires capital.

**Dripping** : the fat from cooked meat, used like butter when cold.

**Beardfoots** : a name some Adaneth!verse Dwarves give Hobbits.

**"Durin's brother"** : the current king of the Firebeards is Regin V, the reawoken Father of that kindred, as the recurring Durin is the Father of the Longbeards.

**Postern** : a back or private door, often designed to facilitate escape.

**Newel** : the central post of a spiral stair, or the post at the end of staircase handrail.

**"kin their fathers had abandoned ages ago for the wealth of Khazad-dûm"** : at the end of the First Age and beginning of the Second, many Dwarves from the Ered Lindon/Luin moved to Khazad-dûm.  After the destruction of the host of Nogrod at Sarn Athrad, Dwarves of Belegost "hastened their departure eastwards"; and when the great mansions of Nogrod and Belegost were ruined in the breaking of Thangorodrim, more joined the Longbeards ( _Unfinished Tales_ , "The History of Galadriel and Celeborn," especially n. 4; _LotR_ , App. B, Second Age, q.v. c. 40).

**Gundabad** : Mount Gundabad, where Durin first woke, was revered by Dwarves and the place of assembly for the seven kindreds early in their history.  However, Orcs have repeatedly captured and used Gundabad as their own "capital" since Sauron invaded Eriador in S.A. 1695 (HoME XII: _The Peoples of Middle-Earth_ , "Of Dwarves and Men").

**The Deathless** : Durin.


	2. Longest Day

__ Lay me on an anvil, O God.  
__ Beat me and hammer me into a crowbar.  
_ Let me pry loose old walls.  
_ __ Let me lift and loosen old foundations.

—Carl Sandburg, "Prayers of Steel"

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

On so fair a day, the breeze was as welcome as the cloud-shadows that drifted across the vale, slow as grazing cattle, providing warmth and shade by turns.  Lame leg laid out before him on a comfortable outcrop of stone, Veylin puffed on his pipe and watched Bruni watch Grimr as he handled his tools. 

The Longbeard was properly respectful, but not timid—how could an anvil be sounded without striking it well?—yet it was still a ticklish business, swinging another man's hammers, and he a stranger to you.  Nonetheless, Veylin knew Bruni seldom used these now that he had enough trade in the mansion to spare him tramping the countryside; and the commission to renew the grates and firebacks in Thrir's Hall would repay him for any harm Grimr might do.  He might gain even more if Veylin took the man on, and he chose to sell the kit to equip him. 

"What are you looking for?" Bruni asked, as Grimr went back through the pockets on the leather rolls, feeling in the corners. 

"Nails.  Or am I to make those as well?" 

Veylin blew out a stream of smoke.  "Why not?"  It was a fine day, and after so much feasting and bargaining, and so many councils, he was glad of a little peace, even if it were punctuated by the metallic ring of the forge.  He had been given much to think about and this seemed a good opportunity to start, particularly since he contemplated adding another Longbeard to his company. 

Grimr glanced to where Oski held Veylin's grazing pony on a long lead, upwind of the forge-fire.  "How many shoes does he need?" 

"Usually none, but I cross the mountains so often now it would be as well to shoe his forefeet."  If they proved unnecessary, they could be easily removed.  Veylin was glad the West Council would be held at Sulûnduban this year, though Saelon might miss his company on the way to the Havens.  It was all this riding that deviled his knee, which popped and crackled as he stretched its stiffness.  No sooner did the ache begin to ease than he was in the saddle again. 

Regin was trying to wear him down: the spring quarter-court, Midsummer . . . and this year Durin's Day would be hard on the heels of the West Council, with Yule close behind.  Still, he had won leave for absence from the summer court on the promise of rich prospecting, and that would allow him to feast Saelon and her folk as had been arranged.  If Grimr proved suitable, that would be another promise fulfilled as well. 

Bruni had done no farriery, and the Longbeard brooded long over the tools before him before finally taking up a punch and the coarsest file.  Going over to the pony, he inspected its hooves, scraping them clean with the punch and filing them even before taking their measure with his hands, then came back and put three pieces of bar-iron in the fire. 

Veylin understood enough of iron to see he knew his trade, but he left the subtleties of craft to Bruni and observed the man.  Some found it hard to work under watchful eyes, though a tramping smith ought to be used to onlookers.  Grimr was neither quick nor slow, save that he sometimes hesitated in choosing among the unfamiliar tools. 

His deliberation was reassuring.  Veylin had found him headlong the other night, but after speaking to Oski, he was willing to make allowances, for the man's situation was wretched.  They were not near kin—Oski did not know who Grimr's nearest living kin might be—but his father had assured him that the smith came from an ancient family, ironfounders of high repute rather than lineage.  He had been in Thráin's following and fought in the War, but parted company with the Heirs of Durin not long before Thráin stole away in the night, leaving even his son in doubt of his fate. 

Aided by several pitchers of Regin's formidable stout, Veylin had attempted to lead Balin, one of Thráin's last companions, to that tale at the feast—but with little success, for all Balin's youth and amiability.  Such erratic behavior on the part of the Eldest's heirs did not inspire trust.  Little wonder, then, that staunch Dwarves were seeking the patronage of others.  Yet that only made Regin's decision to prentice Reynir with Gróin at Furnace Fells less comprehensible. 

"Will you tell me something of Gunduzahar?" Grimr asked, dropping the new-cut nails into the quenching bucket and taking up the second bar of glowing iron with his tongs.  "Oski would not say much, save that it was fine and prosperous—and not too near the sea." 

So he would talk while he worked?  "Are you daunted by the sea?"  He could hardly smith at White Cliffs if he was. 

"I do not know.  I have never been near it."  Putting the iron to the mandrel, he bent it into shape.  "Folk say it is fearsome, but plainly your company does not find it so." 

Veylin chuffed complacently, shifting his pipe.  "It is a matter of degree.  Some want more shoring in a mine than others.  That is the best I can describe it: so much water is as awesome as stone, but less steadfast.  One day it will be quiet; on another it rises up and growls."  How taken aback he had been, when Saelon told him she found Dwarves not unlike!  "The nearest we commonly go is to White Cliffs, where the Men dwell.  That lies at the back of a great bay, a dozen chains from the shore and sixty paces above the flood." 

Having flattened the arc, Grimr set the shoe back in the coals and brought out the other bar.  "Do you have much commerce with the Men there?" 

"Not by your account, I am sure.  White Cliffs is not Dale, and Gunduzahar is not Erebor—we number no more than three-score between us.  But we find profit in each other, in a small way." 

This shoe did not take shape so easily as the first, and Grimr did not speak again until he was satisfied, gesturing Oski closer so he could check the shape against the hoof.  "Is there enough work to keep a blacksmith?" 

He certainly spoke sensibly.  "Among the Men, no.  But we have only a single ironsmith now, and he barely serves our own needs.  Gunduzahar is mine as well as delf, a tough basalt rich in copper and other treasure.  Hakki is a rare hand at shaping pick and shovel, so most of the work would be general ironmongery: hardware for doors, strapping for chests and hoops for barrels, nails and spikes for our carpenter.  Have you made locks?" 

"None a Dwarf would respect."  With a sharp _ping_ , Grimr struck the first nailhole in the shoe. 

Forthright, too.  Veylin smiled.  "That was too much to hope.  It will be dull work, I'm afraid, but steady.  Would you prefer a wage or a share?" 

Another _ping_.  "I would need to know more about the venture to choose.  Let me finish this, and when you have decided whether—" _ping_ "—I will suit, we can dicker." 

Veylin leaned back against the jut of rock behind him and let the man get on with his work.  When the holes were punched and the fit checked one last time against the hooves with the shoes hot, Grimr drove the nails home with sure blows, clenching them neatly. 

When he had stepped back from the beast, Veylin waved at Oski.  "Put him through his paces." 

As Grimr conscientiously watched the animal mince through a circle at a walk, then trot with more confidence, Veylin caught Bruni's eye and discreetly signed, in purest Firebeard mode, _Your thought_? 

_Chance of bargain here_ , Bruni answered, and scratched at his beard. 

Grimr turned back and looked over the scraps of iron left.  "Do you wish to see anything else?" 

"How are you at knives?"  He would not be able to forge one for them; Bruni had not supplied steel, and there was not enough iron left for more than a child's blade.  But Veylin thought his word would be good.  He had seen the slender shivs the Men of White Cliffs carried, poor things to start with and now whetted almost to uselessness.  That was one of their greatest needs. 

Drawing his, Grimr came over and handed it to him. 

The edge was very good, and the pattern of the blade handsome.  With a nod of approval, Veylin passed it to Bruni.  "Oski!  Come and clear up." 

"I like this steel," the Firebeard smith said.  "Where did you get it?" 

"I made it in our foundry at Erebor, from Iron Hills ore." 

Would he perhaps be interested in unlocking the secret of the Elves' sea-steel?  "Well," Veylin declared, "if you can be civil to Men and bear the sea, I am willing to employ you." 

"If the Men are friendly, as you say," Grimr allowed, taking back his knife, "I foresee no difficulties there.  But how can I give any assurance about the sea, until I have seen it?" 

"If you come to Gunduzahar and find you cannot bear the sea, I will find you employment elsewhere among my folk." 

Grimr bowed in acknowledgement.  "Would you grant me an advance, so I can purchase my tools, or did you think to provide me with them?" 

This was a delicate point.  Were he near kin, or could provide some security, an advance would be expected; but he was not, and could not, if he had been stripped as cruelly as he claimed.  What a man made with his own tools and materials, on his own time, was his own; while if he used another's tools, that entitled their owner to a share.  Did he only want enough employment to re-equip himself, or was he seeking a home as well? 

It did not matter.  Who could be blamed for seeking enough independence to avoid imposition?  "Would you have purchased tools, or make your own?" 

"I must start with someone else's, although I would rather make my own." 

Bruni was following this with such interest, Veylin was sure he would be willing to part with at least some of the kit Oski was rolling back up to load on the pony.  "How would it be if I provided you what you needed to start, and advanced you funds for, say, a hundredweight of iron and a stone and a half of steel?" 

"That would still give you an interest in my work," Grimr pointed out dryly. 

"I hope I take an interest in the work of all who are in my company.  Buy your rights back, as you can!  I do not want to bind you with debt."  Veylin considered, clasping his hands about his good knee.  Grimr might fear he would strike an easy bargain with Bruni, and pass the price along to him—such things happened, too often.  "Find what you require, and get what price you can—I will pay it, and ask only an extra tenth in return." 

Grimr drew on his beard.  "I think," he said, still chary, "I will need to hear more about how you reckon shares at Gunduzahar." 

"Of course.  Come to supper this evening," Veylin proposed, with a sudden desire to know the Longbeard better.  "We can hammer out the details, and I will introduce you to other members of the company." 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Running a finger inside the snug collar of his borrowed jacket, Grimr sighed at his scraping vanity and gave the bell-chain beside the grand blue-figured doors a brisk pull.  There was no time now to reconsider again. 

One wide panel swung promptly open.  "Welcome!" Oski greeted him, as he came into the foyer, smile as bright as the gold of his beard.  "The table is already set.  Thyrð is cooking, so it will be no feast, but I suppose it may be better than what you get at Raun's."  Glancing towards the nearer doorward's bench, where a younger lad sat with a book on his lap, Oski proclaimed, "Skjarr, this is Grimr of Erebor.  Remember: none but near kin, ealdormen, or pressing need." 

The youngster looked up grudgingly from the finely-figured pages.  "At your service," he said perfunctorily.  "I remember!" 

"Do not mind him," Oski told Grimr as they passed into the chieftain's high-vaulted hall, softly lit on this quiet night.  "Skjarr is not one of the household—only one of Nordri's many cousins." 

"And who is Nordri?" 

"One of Veylin's ealdormen, and the chief mason of Gunduzahar.  He is there now.  Will you be joining us?" 

Though the hall was empty, Grimr met the lad's look of hopeful curiosity with reserve.  "Negotiations are underway.  How many of our kindred are at Gunduzahar?"  There were other questions he would ask of one who had been under Veylin's authority for some years, but frank answers might earn a prentice his master's displeasure.  That was no way to repay a young kinsman for his assistance. 

"Two, besides myself."  Across a gallery filled with fine sculpture, whose mosaic floor finely depicted an industrious smithy, were three doors; the one in the center stood ajar.  "Vígir is a stonecarver, and came out this year to join his friend Aðal.  Aðal is of Regin's Line," he explained.  "The third is Prut, one of Bersi's miners.  Bersi is a Broadbeam coppersmith who has long been Veylin's friend." 

"Your company seems very mixed." 

"You find that odd?" Oski asked, brows knit. 

Perhaps this child of exile did not.  "In my experience, it is unusual." 

Hand on the latch of the part-open door, the lad grinned at him.  " _That_ is not unusual," he declared with conviction.  Thrusting it open, he nodded down the lobby.  "Second door on the left—I must see how Thyrð is faring, or supper may be late!" 

Abandoned by his guide, Grimr looked around at the long benches set against the ruddy sandstone of the walls, unadorned here.  Fine work in an ancient style, the oak black with age but polished to a mellow shine.  Seldom had he seen such heirlooms, even in his youth: few had dwelt in Erebor until Thrór's return, shortly before his own father's birth.  Why would one who had such an estate, in security, leave it to found a new delf in a threatening land? 

Gunduzahar must be rich indeed. 

Taking a deep breath, Grimr reminded himself that lively prentices bespoke a cheerful house, and went to knock on the second door to the left. 

"Enter!" 

The chamber was a large parlour, its substantial furnishings as antique as those without; Veylin rose from a chair worn to commonplace shabbiness, and a woman at the sideboard turned her head to look his way.  Who—? 

"Welcome!" Veylin said heartily.  "Where is Oski?" 

"He left me at the door to look in on Thyrð, whomever that may be." 

Though the woman—the very handsome woman—frowned, Veylin chuckled.  "Thyrð is my nephew, and Oski's junior as prentice.  This is my sister, Auð, his mother." 

Grimr bowed, as deep as his regret for sparking her displeasure.  "Grimr, son of Linr, at your service."  Her brother's beard might be copper, but hers was flame, dressed with emeralds and red gold. 

"At yours and your family's.  What will you have?" she asked, gesturing towards a silver tray bearing a matched set of flagons.  "Ale?  Wine?" 

Her eyes were emerald as well; yet their coolness recalled him to manners.  Someone had said Veylin's sister was a widow, though plainly she was very well provided for, in kin as well as purse.  Such a woman was bound to find the staring admiration of an impecunious man long starved of female company distasteful.  "Wine, if you will," Grimr said, and turned deliberately back to his host.  "The floor of the gallery without is very fine . . . but you are a gemsmith, are you not?" 

One would not guess it from looking at him now.  Save for his ring of office, he bore few marks of rank or wealth, and his dress was ostentatious only in the excellence of the material and tailoring.  "I am, but many of my fathers loved steel more than jewels.  Will you sit?  If the lads disagree, supper may be delayed." 

"Supper will not be delayed," Auð countered, in the tone of a vow, as Grimr hastened to take the chair Veylin indicated—he was keeping the man standing again.  She placed his wine on the little table at his right hand before taking a seat on the settee against the wall. 

Veylin chuffed.  "Who works with them both, day after day?  They _may_ be late—but not by much, and the time will not have been ill-spent." 

His sister sniffed and turned to Grimr, who was not sure how to take such chaffing.  It was not unpleasant, but the degree of familiarity was uncomfortable on so brief an acquaintance.  "So you may join us at Gunduzahar?" 

Us—it was not mere gossip; she was part of the company.  "I am very much interested."  To divide his attention, Grimr took up the cup she had brought him.  Shapely crystal, garnet wine: these, too, were beauties he had long been denied. 

They approached no nearer the business before supper.  Indeed, Auð had sounded out no more than his lack of acquaintance in Sulûnduban before Oski appeared to announce the meal, and once they were seated, Veylin firmly shifted the burden of conversation to his prentices, questioning them about their work and preparations for the journey across the mountains. 

He did not spare his nephew, who was so like his mother that Grimr wondered what her spouse had contributed to his making.  Thyrð was very much on his dignity as he passed around the chops and buttered parsnips, but Oski's misgivings seemed groundless.  It was an ordinary family supper, good food and no cheeseparing: Grimr found it deeply reassuring, perhaps most when the lads began squabbling over who was to catch the ponies. 

So he and his brother had argued, long ago.  The hole in his heart could not be mended, but the remembrance was precious, a glint of gold in dark rock. 

"I had to wrangle the beasts across the mountains twice," Thyrð objected hotly, "and Haust's cursed bog-hoppers as well, while he was on holiday here!" 

"Holiday!" Oski scoffed.  "Have you been to the mine at Bald Head?" 

Veylin heard them out, unmoved.  "If you wish to return to my workshop, ponies we must have.  You have done more than your share, Thyrð, it is true; that is why Oski will be responsible for my train this trip.  But your mother's goods need carrying as well, and I do not see why I should arrange it now that you are capable." 

"No, indeed," Auð concurred.  "When you have cleaned up here this evening, come see me in the parlour at home.  I will give you the list of what is to go, so you know how many beasts you will need." 

"Yes, Mother," Thyrð said, with a set to his jaw that would have made Grimr smile, if the lad would not resent it. 

"What do you traffic in?" he asked Auð, when dour silence threatened. 

"I am a tailor."  Setting down her glass of ale, she surveyed his borrowed and ill-fitting finery without pity.  "The Men at White Cliffs weave decent woolen, but they grow no flax and want linen." 

"You trade with them yourself?"  It was not unheard of, or had not been in Erebor, but the women who ventured into Dale had been eccentric spinsters like Ferli's aunt Svigi, or hard-pressed widows like Gufa Greybeard.  He had difficulty imagining this woman, in her elegantly cut hall-coat and jewels, traveling abroad dressed like a man. 

She colored up prettily.  "I have traded a little with the women of Men—with the Lady Saelon, and her niece has expressed an interest as well." 

Grimr chased the butter and juices from his plate with a last piece of crust.  "My uncle, who dealt in tinware, had a great respect for the shrewdness of the goodwives of Dale.  Yet here in Eriador I find I am rarely able to speak to a woman of Men, at least those of any substance.  Their husbands keep the business all in their own hands." 

"Mistrust," Veylin declared, amusement at his sister's discomfiture fled.  "Of us, and of their own women." 

Such abrupt aggravation bespoke grievance.  "Do you find that at White Cliffs?"  He had naught but praise for those Men before. 

"Less than in other places.  The Lady rules there." 

His friend, it was said; some hinted more.  If his folk thought them too familiar, what must hers feel?  "I have never heard of a ruling lady, outside of tales."  Not among Men, at any rate.  "Is she one of the Men of the West?" 

"She is.  Her brother was the lord of Srathen Brethil—Birkidale, many call it—which was beset by monstrous fiends, not unlike trolls.  Many of her kin were slain, and their people fled.  The wisest took refuge with her where she dwells by the sea.  Her brother sent his children and, after his death, the war-helm of their house, bidding her keep their folk until his son comes of age." 

Save that a woman was given a man's charge, this was a tale Grimr knew too well.  "These fiends brought grief to you as well, did they not?" 

The quality of the silence about the table told him he had said more than he meant.  "They did," Veylin affirmed solemnly.  "One fell upon a prospecting party I led, not far from White Cliffs.  My brother in gems and by marriage was slain, as was my prentice.  I was sorely wounded; but the Lady's young cousin Gaernath discovered me and the Lady, who is a master of herbs and healing, mended me.  When her houseless folk came upon her, I repaid my debt with a few chambers in their cliff, and we made a pact of vengeance between us." 

"Which you have taken," Grimr said, as Veylin drank his wine. 

"Which we have taken," he amended.  "But that is not a story to be done justice to before rising from the table, and we have, I hope, at least one bargain yet to make this evening.  Top up your glass," he invited, standing, "and let us leave the lads to their work.  Auð, will I see you at breakfast tomorrow?" 

"No—I am already promised to Eigsa.  Will you join us there for dinner?  She would be glad of the company, and to hear more of Nordri than I can tell."  Auð looked his way.  "You would be welcome, too, Grimr, if you can come to an agreement with my brother.  Eigsa is the wife and mother of Gunduzahar's chief masons." 

Was this only to tempt him to close the deal?  "That is very kind.  I would be glad to meet more of those connected to your company, but I should not like to impose—and if I come to an agreement with your brother, I must seek the tools I will need to do the work.  Some other time, perhaps, if fortune is favorable." 

"Good fortune, then," she wished, rising to bow.  She appeared not displeased by his caution.  "Thyrð, take the wine to your uncle's cabinet.  Do not rush here: I will need more than an hour to draft my list." 

Grimr bent low in return.  "And to you," he murmured, since her attention was already elsewhere. 

"Come," Veylin repeated his invitation, smiling.  "Let us talk." 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**Grates and firebacks** : these are pieces of fireplace furniture, which protect the stone or brick of a hearth from heat damage.  A grate holds the fuel off the floor of the hearth, also assuring that the fire gets enough draft to burn well.  A fireback is a plate of iron, sometimes decorated, that sits behind the grate; it absorbs and re-radiates the heat of the fire.

**Thrir's Hall** : the ancestral apartments of the chieftains of Veylin's line.

**"the spring quarter-court, Midsummer . . ."** : Tolkien wrote almost nothing regarding Dwarvish calendars, so I have been forced to develop my own.  The fact that Durin's Day falls on the "the first day of the last moon of Autumn on the threshold of Winter" ( _The Hobbit_ , "A Short Rest") strongly suggests Dwarves use a lunisolar calendar.  The Dwarves of Nogrod held high feast at Midsummer ( _The Silmarillion_ , "Of Maeglin"), which further suggests Dwarves recognize and celebrate the solstices.  Since Dwarves issue contracts ( _The Hobbit_ , "Roast Mutton"), I have surmised that they have a regular system of courts to enforce them and borrowed the concept of quarter-sessions and quarter-days to represent this.  To put a lunisolar spin on this, I here propose that Dwarvish quarter days are the first day of the first quarter of the second moon of a season: so that the Spring quarter-court of 2850 was held on April 29th, or the 8th of Lótessë (Lothron).  If it seems idiosyncratic to use the second moon rather than the first (or last), this was done to prevent clashes and/or overlap with the solstice-based high-days.

As a fuller example, and to better illustrate the demands on Veylin's time, here are the principal dates in this year for Dwarves.  Since Tolkien used the moon phases of A.D. 1941–2 for T.A. 3018–19 ( _The Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion_ , pp. xlvi–xlvii), I have used those of A.D. 1773 for T.A. 2850.

            New Year/Durin's Day: Nov. 27 or Ringarë/Girithron 8, 2849  
            Yule: Dec. 21 or Yule/Yestarë, 2849  
            Winter quarter-court: Jan. 30 or Nénimë/Nínui 10, 2850  
            Spring quarter-court: Apr. 29 or Lótessë/Lothron 8, 2850  
            Midsummer: June 21 or Loëndë, 2850  
            Summer quarter-court: Jul. 26 or Úrimë/Urui 5, 2850  
            West Council/Autumn quarter-court: Nov. 21 or Ringarë/Girithron 2, 2850  
            New Year/Durin's Day: Dec. 6 or Ringarë/Girithron 17, 2850

**Bar-iron** : think of "sticks" of iron, not brick-shaped ingots.  This is bloomery or forged iron, not pig or cast iron.  Iron melts at an extremely high temperature (1540°C/2804°F), so that until recent centuries, producing iron from ore meant melting everything _but_ the iron, and forging the metal left behind into a useful shape.

**Cut nails** : until the nineteenth century, nails were square rather than round—cut from a flattened piece of metal rather than drawn like wire.

**Mandrel** : a rod or cylinder, often set into an anvil, around which metal is bent or shaped.

**Hundredweight** : 112 lbs or 50.9 kg; a stone is 14 lbs. or 6.3 kg.

**Settee** : an elegant settle, usually upholstered and with a lower back.


	3. Ninth Part of a Hair

_ Virtue is like a rich stone—best plain set. _

—Francis Bacon, _Of Beauty_

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

"We have not put you off, I hope, with so casual a supper," Veylin said, leading Grimr out into the gallery.  "Gunduzahar is a small place, and of necessity we are all familiar there.  This way," he directed, swinging his stick towards the door to his offices.

His chief motive had been to see how the Longbeard bore the lack of ceremony, since some of that kindred could be aggravatingly haughty.  Take Prut, who must voice his opinion on everything, although he was only a pitman.  Two of them would be intolerable, reinforcing each other.  Yet if Grimr was workaday as he seemed, he wanted to put the man at ease.  Anything grander would have thrown his poverty into stark relief; nor had he wanted to burden him with hospitality he might find hard to repay.  If they could not come to an agreement, a simple meal would discharge any obligation he might feel.

"Not at all," Grimr assured him.  "I have been too long a stranger at the tables of other folk.  Your sister was very gracious."

"I am glad you found her so, for she is more difficult to please than any other in our company."  Let that be a warning to him, if he would hear.  Veylin was uncertain whether he should be amused or uneasy, but Auð had certainly been gratified by Grimr's decently damped admiration.  Her susceptibility surprised him. . . but then he found the fellow likable himself.

As they passed through the lazuli antechamber and into the study, Grimr hazarded, "I confess when I first heard there were women at Gunduzahar, I did not credit it.  What has taken them there?"

The fire had burnt down in his absence, and Veylin went to the hearth to heap fresh coal on the grate.  "In Auð's case, a desire to keep a watchful eye on her menfolk!  Will you smoke?" he asked, gesturing his guest towards the chair nearer the corner.  "I have Old Toby, and also Staddle-leaf."

"Old Toby, if you please."

Veylin was taken by the man's composure as they filled their pipes in silence.  Was this confidence or fatalism?  Grimr was bunking with a comrade from the War in a Fifth Deep bedsit and eating at cheap pie-stalls, but he savoured the leaf as quietly as he had the wine at dinner.  After lighting his own briar, Veylin tossed the spill in the fire and lowered himself into the other chair.  "Not that I tried hard to dissuade her.  We mean to found a substantial delf, and a hall is not a home without a woman's touch.  She has since persuaded Sút, her childhood friend, to join her, and Bersi's wife as well.  I suspect she will work on Eigsa tomorrow."

"Will you tell me more of the company, and how you reckon shares?"

There: was that a shade of impatience at last?  "I am one of the principals; the other is Rekk, Ekki's son.  He is a waterwright and has been invaluable—is overseeing the plumbing of the baths even now—but his interest in the place comes from his brother Thekk, my partner in the venture that discovered its wealth."  An interest that would go, in time, to Thekk's sons.  It would not repay Thyrnir and Thyrð for the loss of their father, not even once his own share had been thrown into the balance, but it would establish them as well as Thekk could have wished.  "We each take two pennies from a shilling's profit."

"Gross or net?"

"Net.  If you come in on shares, you will get your food and drink, coals and lighting as perquisites.  We have a very good cook, and generally dine together in the hall."

A knock on the door heralded Thyrð's arrival with the wine as the Longbeard weighed this.  Taking his glass from the tray, Veylin noticed that an assortment of comfits had made their way into a dish beside the walnuts.  Was that Oski's doing, or Auð's?  "Thank you, Thyrð.  Set it on the table there, convenient to Grimr.  I want no more."

"Is the allowance of wine this generous in Gunduzahar?" Grimr wondered, topping up his glass with a moderate hand as the lad left them.

Was the fellow in earnest, or was that an attempt at jest, the humor sapped by restraint?  Veylin decided to take it as the latter.  "Alas, our bursary does not yet stretch as far as a common ration of wine."

"What are the provisions for bed and chamber?"

"We have just expanded the dormitory for short-term men.  If you desire your own apartment, I would require a long-term contract . . . and it would have to be cut for you."

Grimr took a walnut from the tray and cracked it in his hand.  "Provided I do not have to share the bed, I have no objections to a dormitory.  Linens are supplied, or at my own cost?"

Taking a deep draught on his pipe, Veylin blew out the smoke.  "You have been in some hard places."  He had traveled enough to know the indignities one met on the road; and appreciated that when he had gone among Men to trade, they craved his jewels enough to treat him with some care.  A blacksmith would get no such consideration.  That the Longbeard was leery of inn-keepers' tricks from a fellow Dwarf, however, spoke ill of more than Men.

Grimr's gaze was level, rejecting pity.  "I have."

"Then let me be clear.  I do not believe a stinted man can give his best work.  I want a man's best, and I am willing to pay for it.  If you join the company, you will be decently provided with your necessities, save clothes for your back and boots for your feet, and divide a penny on the shilling with the prentices and other indebted men.  If you prefer a wage, you must pay for your bed and board out of it."

"How many prentices and indebted men do you have?"

"Seven prentices and two miners beholden to Bersi, our coppersmith."

"How many are taking wages?"

"One.  I do not include the plumber we have brought in to work on the baths, or his prentices—he has contracted for a set fee."

Casting the empty bits of shell into the fire, Grimr asked, "Do you distribute profits quarterly or yearly?"

"Yearly."

"Will you tell me what those were for the last year?"

"Over three hundred pounds.  That was only our second year, and the first we got much copper.  This year looks to be as good, or better."  Provided he could get out and find some nice stones.  All the delving supplied ample ore for Bersi, and the peridots they had not gifted to the women had fetched a fine price; but he might have to sell some cabochon fire opals to uphold his part.  The work on Regin's regalia had brought honor rather than profit, though the commissions he had received since Midsummer would pay very well indeed.

The ironmaster cracked another walnut, very thoughtfully.  "Is any of a man's work his own, or does it all go to the company?"

"That would depend on how much of it came from Gunduzahar.  Rekk, for instance, repaired a mill pond in the Shire last summer—all we got of that were the foodstuffs he chose to bring back with him."  Veylin paused before adding, "If you forge for the Men of White Cliffs in their settlement, with your own iron and tools, the profit would be at your discretion."  Should Grimr choose to rack the Men to secure his independence a little sooner, it would be difficult to prevent him . . . yet the need of Saelon's people was great enough to bear a premium, if their own shrewdness did not shield them.

"Who decides, if there is any dispute?"

"The company."  Companions had more ways to discourage selfishness than their leader did.  Therefore he strove to collect followers who shared gain as willingly as work, and was not displeased by his success.  If Grimr grew too self-interested, he would find them uncongenial, as Siggr and Hodr had.

"Why have you not already found an ironsmith, with terms as fair as those?" Grimr asked, with frankness near challenge.

Trading pipe for glass, Veylin huffed with relief and annoyance.  Was that what made the man so cautious?  "Some fear the sea; others find the work too trifling.  There is neither iron nor coal near to hand, so haulage will eat into their profits."  Those were disadvantages; it was best to be plain.  "My cousins and heirs, ironmasters both, were with us at the start—but the elder was killed when we slew the fiends, and his brother now prefers Sulûnduban.  Nor," he sighed, "is it easy to find one who thinks well of Men."

"That is important to you?"

"It is."  How often, in what was nearing two years since he had promised Saelon he would seek a smith for them, had that been the sticking point, frustrating his hopes?  Now, when he felt a need to make amends to her for his brusqueness at their last meeting, it weighed more heavily still.  "For they think well of us, and is that not a rare and valuable thing?"

Grimr gazed at the broken nutshell in his palm.  "When I was young," he reflected, "the esteem of Men was a commonplace.  I have since learned—to my great cost," he confessed, with rising bitterness, "that it is indeed rare.  But valuable?"  He thumbed through the fragments, then consigned them to the flames.  "They were no help when the dragon came."

Yet he broke the freighted silence between them before it grew too perilous.  "You may have found otherwise," he allowed, casting a brooding glance at Veylin's game leg and taking up his pipe again.

There were many things he might have said in reply . . . but he did not know this man well enough for any of them.  "I do not require that you like them.  Only that you use them civilly."

"That I cannot lose the habit of," Grimr said with a curt, crooked smile, "even when they abuse me."

"If the Lady or any of her folk abuse you," Veylin swore, "you may tear up your contract, and I will cancel your debt."

A gleam flared in the ironmaster's eye. "You will put that in writing?" and then, as swiftly, in a harsh voice, "No—do not tempt me!  Your offer is generous as it stands.  If you will still have me, I will dare the Men and the sea."

"I will," Veylin said promptly, to relieve what strain he could; for he judged the second cry was the truer sounding of the man.  To be reduced to debt was a humiliation, degrading to confess even to kin.  Yet Grimr had no kin left who could cover him, and of late the fathers of his kindred had brought more grief than aid to their people.  It spoke well of him that he found this hard.  "Do you want the advance for the metal?" he asked, for such practicalities might steady him.

With a gusty breath, Grimr raked a hand down his long beard.  "Might you make it two stones of steel, in addition to the hundredweight of iron?" he countered, eyes grim.

He had already given the offer full consideration.  Veylin calculated; the advance would be more than his share for a year, and there would still be the cost of his tools to repay, with interest.  "If you like.  Have you found the tools you need?"

"Bruni has made me an offer.  I will look further tomorrow.  When do you leave for Gunduzahar?"

Veylin rose and went to his desk.  "In three days.  Do you have a pony?"

"That," Grim said wryly, "I have.  But I will need at least two more for the metal and my gear.  You said you have one ironsmith—is there more than one anvil in the forge, or must we freight that as well?  Furnaces?  Bellows?"

Smiling privately at the "we," Veylin checked the point on his pen.  "My cousins had so much trouble getting the larger anvils across the moors, I took pity on Vitnir and let him sell them to me.  Their bare-furnished smithy is at your disposal; Haki has his own."  Yet they would need more coal.  Taking several sheets of parchment from the press, he asked, "Is there anything else you require?  Speak now: you will get better prices on almost everything here in the mansion.  My sister's tailoring does not come cheap!"

"I thank you for the warning, but I am not entirely without resources," the Longbeard asserted, a modest show of dignity.  "Once we have closed, and I know where the next groat is coming from, I can loosen my purse-strings."

"Once we have closed, and you have signed," Veylin observed, "you are a member of the company, and my hall is open to you.  As you have seen, it is sadly empty just now, and though I am pleased by my prentices, their youth can be trying.  I should be glad of your company these few days before we depart, and the chance to know you better."  That would spare him the price of his meals, at least, and further imposition on his friend.  "Barring the advance, there will be no groats until Durin's Day."

Grimr said, gravely, "You are very good."

Veylin huffed, softly, and wrote the date broad and fair.  "All to my own gain, I assure you.  Be warned!  If I like you and your work, I will try to keep you at Gunduzahar once your debt is paid."  Let him understand that he was preparing the ground.  If he was mistaken in the man, the hospitality cost him little; yet it might bring handsome dividends if time compounded the good will so gained.

With the reserve of one who had found fortune cruelly fickle, Grimr hesitated.  "Let us see what time brings.  Draw up the contract first, and we will go from there."

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

"Whoever told you you could cook?" Auð demanded, taking the pot from her brother.  "Get away, before you spoil another meal!"

"Spoil?" Veylin objected, taken aback but rallying swiftly.  "What was wrong with supper last night?  Or breakfast?"

"You mix porridge as if it were mortar, and cut the carrots in such great chunks that they were half-raw.  Is that how you cleave gems?"

"They are _carrots_ , Auð!"

Heaving one of the chests of iron from the larger pony, Grimr looked over his shoulder towards the sudden quarrel and frowned.

"All is well," Oski assured him, low, and chuckled as he bent to hobble one of Veylin's packbeasts.  "They often squabble here.  Auð is uneasy without a roof, and his leg pains him."

"There is no secure place to sleep hereabouts?"  Last night they had sheltered in an abandoned house, cunningly cut into the knap of the land: small and snug, yet melancholy, speaking of a family extinguished.  The overhang here would keep off no more than the rain.  Not that he scorned it—for himself, he thought it a fine camping place—but a woman ought to have more.

"No.  The only delf this side of the peaks is Gunduzahar, and that is another day's journey still.  Shall I give you a hand with the other chest?"

"I will not say no!"  That was very kind in the lad, when he had so much work of his own, but barring occasional sparks such as these struck between brother and sister, the party was an amiable one.  Thyrð was coolest to him, looking unfavorably on anything near familiarity with his mother, but that was natural and did not reach incivility.

Even the ground was genial: the Blue Mountains were less precipitous than the Misty, round-headed and fingered with soft-bottomed vales.  But the bogs were flagged with white-tufted grass, warning the traveler, and the long, fair days gave ample time for the heavily burdened ponies to trudge from ridge to firmer ridge, where there was also breeze enough to keep the midges at bay.

This was the pleasantest traveling he had done all year, after the deep snows of the past winter and heavy mud that followed the thaw.  There was food aplenty, even if the roots in last night's stew had been a bit crunchy, and with four of them to take turns on watch, a man could get a decent night's sleep.

On the other side of the boulder, Thyrð swore.

"What is it?" Oski asked, but his fellow only hoisted a packsaddle onto his shoulder and stomped over to the small fire still wasting its heat on the air.  As his mother vehemently reminded his glowering uncle of a supper he had marred a century before, Thyrð cast the frame onto the ground with a clatter.

His elders turned to him as one.  "What is this?" Veylin demanded, storm-browed.

"One of the bars is cracked.  Right through."

"Yes?"  And when the lad did not answer, "Well, fix it!"

"With what?  There is no suitable wood.  Hardly," Thyrð kicked at the shrubby stuff they were burning, "any wood at all.  Nor have I done this before."

"It is a few pieces of wood," Auð exclaimed, casting her eyes to the stone above them.  "What can you not work out?  Your brother was making such things when he was half your age."

"Thyrnir has a gift for wood," Thyrð said stoutly.  "I do not."

"Give it to me," Veylin growled, taking a seat on one of his small, heavily bound chests.  "Bring me the box of common tools."

The lad went without further excuse.  Grimr followed after Oski, who carried his master's chests and boxes underneath the overhang without hesitation, stacking his own atop at the southern end to wall out the cool night wind.  Auð took the pot back to the fire and set about repairing supper while her brother surveyed the saddle.

When Thyrð brought his uncle a battered box, Veylin said curtly, "Get those beasts watered and hobbled."

By chance, Grimr caught the quick flash of Oski's hands, directed towards his junior.  _You're a good boy._

Thyrð shied a stone at him, and stomped off towards the nearby tarn with his mother's string of ponies.

Was that derision?  The stone missed its mark, and he had seen no evidence of ill-will between the two prentices, only a praiseworthy rivalry.  Indeed, the lads seemed evenly matched, Oski's slight seniority contending with the scant favor Thyrð's kinship gained him with their master.  Still, the younger lad was proud.  Why should he make an exhibition of his incompetence and lack of endeavor?

Grimr glanced back at Thyrð's elders.  Veylin was prying the front fork off the bars; Auð held the pot over the fire, nudging a supporting rock into better position with the toe of her boot.  Both were absorbed in their work, disagreement blown over like a black-bellied cloud.

Perhaps Thyrð was a good boy . . . but if so, he was also uncommonly shrewd for his age.

His mother stinted him at supper, so if she was aware of any contrivance, she did not approve of the presumption.  Veylin . . . .  Grimr did not know him well enough to be certain.  From all he had seen, he was diligent in teaching his prentices, but instead of explaining how the saddle might be mended and leaving it to the lad, or making Thyrð attend closely while he did so, he let Auð heap camp chores on the boy and did the job himself.  He was not baffled by the want of wood, reshaping one arm of a fork to serve as a new bar, and requiring his nephew to bring withies back with him when he finished washing the dishes.

"Will that take a chest?" Grimr asked dubiously, when Veylin finished binding the bundled twigs to the other half of the fork.

"No," the gemsmith confessed, frowning at his creation.  "The new bar is too narrow as well, but we will load the beast lightly and double the blanket, and it should not gall."  Setting the packsaddle aside, he took up the cracked board, studying it closely before tossing it into the fire.  "We will be in Gunduzahar tomorrow, and Grani or Thyrnir will repair it properly."

Grani, he had gathered, was their carpenter.  "Thyrnir is the elder of Auð's sons?"

"Yes, and more of his father's temper than this rapscallion.  But I know how to pay out his sloth."  Turning on his seat, Veylin craned his neck, looking up to find the fat waxing moon, glowing through a gathering veil of clouds.  "The weather will worsen tomorrow.  It would be good to get an early start.  Will the wind veer to the east, do you think?"

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Notes

**"Ninth part of a hair"** : Shakespeare, _Henry IV_ , Part I—"But in the way of bargain, mark you me, I'll cavil on the ninth part of a hair."

**Lazuli** : lapis lazuli, a semiprecious stone noted for its vivid blue color.  Blue is the "heraldric" color of Veylin's sept, which is why it shows up repeatedly in his hall in Sulûnduban, despite his personal preference for warmer colors.

**Old Toby, and . . . Staddle-leaf** : Old Toby was considered, by that grand master of pipe-weed lore Meriadoc Brandybuck, one of the best varieties of leaf grown in the Shire.  Bree-hobbits, who lived mainly in Staddle, also grew pipe-weed.

**The War** : the War of Dwarves and Orcs (T.A. 2793–2799).

**Bedsit** : a single-room apartment, which serves as both bedroom and sitting room.

**Briar** : a pipe carved from a briar-root.

**Spill** : a sliver of wood, used to carry fire from one location to another.

**"Gross or net?"** : gross is the total before costs have been deducted, while net is what is left after all deductions have been made.

**Perquisites** : benefits attached to a position in addition to wages or salary.  Today we usually just talk about the "perks" someone gets.

**Comfits** : candied fruit, spices, or seeds.

**Bursary** : the treasury of a communal institution, such as a monastery or a college.

**Cabochon** : a rounded gem ground and polished into shape rather than cut in facets.

**Press** : a shelved cupboard, often placed in a recess in a wall.

**Bar** : one of the two pieces of wood that run along the animal's back in the frame of [packsaddle](http://www.classicalfencing.com/articles/img/fourprongs.jpg).  The forks are the crosspieces over the back.


	4. Most Knowing of Persons

_             Decent fall the cloths  
_ _ over a high income _

—John Berryman, _His Toy, His Dream, His Rest_ , Poem 196 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

As the leaden clouds opened, hurling rain down with the force of tiny hammers, Auð dashed in the Back Door.  Veylin, stumping through the torrent more phlegmatically, was not far behind her, while without, Oski bellowed for someone to come and help him get the baggage under cover. 

"Here, Mother," Thyrnir said, appearing from the relative darkness of the receiving hall.  "Let me take your cloak.  How was the Fair?" 

Balnar brushed by, yanking up his hood as he headed out to answer Oski's call.  "Very good!  A shame that you missed it."  So great was her relief at being under stone again, Auð gave her son a buss on the cheek.  "How have you fared here?  Has Thyrð arrived?"  Veylin had sent him ahead almost as soon as they set out, misliking the look of the weather.  How good of him, to spare her cloth a washing! 

Grimr, coming in with one of his boxes of iron, was already soaked through; and her boy, seeing a stranger, drew out of her embrace.  "Yes.  He and Neðan are carrying your bolts to the workroom.  Where would you like the chests to go?" 

"Those with brass studs to my chambers; the rest can go in my storeroom for now." 

"Thyrnir," Veylin called him over, "this is Grimr, son of Linr, ironmaster once of Erebor.  Put his goods in the large smithy and find him a place in the dormitory.  I do not suppose the baths are finished?" 

Thyrnir smiled at his uncle's wistful hope.  "Not quite.  At your service," he offered Grimr, turning to bow to him. 

"At yours and your family's.  Let me get the rest of my gear in—" 

Setting Auð's folded cloak over Veylin's shoulder, Thyrnir said, " I am with you.  Is there much iron?" 

Veylin snorted, lifting the wet woolen as the two headed back out into the rain, then stepped aside as Oski staggered in with two gem-chests at once, barely able to see past them.  "Come, Auð, let us get out of the way.  Balnar," he asked, as Nordri's prentice plunked down one of the chests of provisions, "where is Rekk?" 

"With Haust in the baths, adjusting the setting of the outfall sluice." 

Auð sighed.  Ah, well; if a proper soak was still beyond them, there would be ale, and a good supper she did not have to cook herself. 

Her freight was piled near the foot of the stair that wound its way up to the halls by easy stages.  Little had been carried up as yet, which seemed strange, for Thyrð must have been more than an hour before them.  The waxed outer wrappers of the topmost parcels were faintly damp to the touch . . . had he dallied on the way, and been caught in the first showers? 

Shifting the ungainly shapes, Auð looked for the doubled wax cover with a triple thread of black, and found it right at the very bottom, perfectly dry. 

Relieved, she pried the bolt from the heap.  Thyrð had gotten here before the rain, then, and brought this one in first.  That would make some amends for the disgraceful exhibition he had made of himself before Grimr last night, but more would be required, particularly if he was taking liberties with his time. 

When she caught up to Veylin at the first turning, he asked, "Would you show Grimr around the delf after supper?" 

"If you like.  You do not want to do it yourself?"  There was little, beside gems, that gave him as much pleasure as showing off his new foundation.  Why would he forgo it?  She had seen nothing to suggest a distaste for the Longbeard's company; and as for Veylin's lameness . . . .  From the vantage of some steps lower down, she watched critically as her brother took the next riser.  Well, it seemed no worse than usual, though how could one be certain without catching him unawares? 

"I would, but I may have an errand elsewhere tonight." 

An errand?  Elsewhere?  They had only just arrived, and where else was there to go?  Not White Cliffs, surely; not in this weather.  And why should he say "may"?  Auð was still seeking for a question that would not be presumptuous when the muted clatter of hastily descending boots came down the shaft, soon followed by Thyrð and Neðan. 

"There you are!" Veylin exclaimed heartily.  "A word with you, Thyrð."  As Thyrð gestured his fellow on, Veylin drew aside so she could pass as well.  "I will let you know at supper," he said. 

Lips pursed, Auð looked from brother to son.  Apparently it was not concern for her cloth that had sent Thyrð ahead.  "Very well."  Tucking the double-covered bolt more securely under her arm, she left them to their scheming. 

They had made good time under the threatening sky, so it was some hours yet to supper.  The corridors were empty: if she had not looked into the kitchens to find Bersa, she would not have met anyone.  Five more plates on what he considered short notice put the cook out, but Auð understood his temper now.  She only had to mention the coffee she had purchased at the Fair to command his attention, and a sharp hint that the price or even its availability would vary with her pleasure persuaded him to damp his surliness.  She did not linger—did not want to hear Bersa's crank gossip when her mood was delicately balanced between satisfaction and discontent—and restrained herself from peeking in at the unfinished baths afterwards, hastening instead to the hip-bath that would rid her of the abominable reek of beast-sweat. 

She was sitting before her bedchamber hearth, wringing the last of the wet from her hair and beard, when someone knocked boldly on the outer door.  "Coming!" she bellowed, annoyed and flustered to be caught in her smock.  Snatching up her hall-coat, she headed for the foyer.  "Who is it?" 

"Sút, and no one else!  Are you fit to be seen, or should I come back after supper?" 

Auð rolled her eyes at her friend's vulgarity and flung open the door.  "Get in!  What are you doing, shouting such things in the passageway?" 

Sút paffed, grinning, and came in as briskly as Auð could wish.  "The men are at their work.  How was your journey?" 

"Tolerable.  Do not trust all the men to be predictable," Auð warned, shutting the door firmly.  "Veylin has hired the ironsmith he looked for, a Longbeard named Grimr." 

"Hired?" 

"Yes.  Men in the Hills of Twilight took his pack-pony shortly before Midsummer, and he seeks to re-equip himself."  Stepping into the sitting room, she picked up the double-wrapped bolt of cloth and brought it out to Sút.  "Here—give me your opinion on this." 

Black brows lifting with happy curiosity, Sút hefted the parcel and followed Auð back to her bedchamber.  "Veylin has told him of the Men at White Cliffs?" she asked, taking a seat on the long chest before tugging loose the first knot. 

Auð retrieved comb and towel.  "Let us hope so, since he has rejected several able smiths merely because they spoke slightingly of Men." 

Sút stared.  "Truly?" 

"Near enough.  Grimr, however, was raised in Erebor, so he is familiar with the breed." 

That seemed to give her friend matter for thought, for Sút was silent as she freed the bolt from its bindings and stripped off the outermost wrapper.  "What is he like?" 

"Grimr?" 

"Yes." 

What was he like?  Auð considered as she carefully combed out a tangle.  The look he had given her at their first meeting had quickened her blood, yet when her alarm had subsided she found she was not displeased.  "A goodly kind of man.  Not cheerful, but uncomplaining, and his manners are pleasant."  Many men withdrew, or grew cold when they desired a woman they could not have, and rudeness was excused as evidence of passion.  A woman might be flattered by that if she chose, but what use were such men to her, save in the way of business?  She was not dead, though her love was; and Thekk could not want for society in Mahal's halls, not as she wanted it here.  A conversable man whose regard was modest would be an agreeable addition to the community. 

"Not like Prut, then," Sút said with some relief, and laid open the second jacket of waxed canvas.  "What is it that warrants so much defense?" she exclaimed, gazing on the innermost wrapping of linen with intrigued frustration.  "Cloth of gold?  I have seen men armed for war with less protection." 

Auð smiled.  "I know your opinion of cloth of gold.  Do not stop!"  Sitting back, she watched her friend's suspense with pleased anticipation. 

When Sút turned back the last cover from the figured brocade, Auð was not disappointed.  Eyes wide, the silversmith delicately touched one of the small silver gem-designs strewn across the pitch-black field, creating an effect not unlike the black granite she loved.  "This is lovely," she breathed, and peeled away the rest of the linen so she could gaze on the full breadth of the cloth. 

"Isn't it?"  When the Blacklock had shown it to her in his stall, she knew Sút must have it.  She could even see the coat she would cut from it, to make best use of the maze-key borders.  "Do you want it?" 

"How much?" 

"Give me what I paid, and it is yours.  If," Auð proposed, "you give me an equal measure of your own time in return, I promise you a suit for the Welcoming Feast of the West Council that will have Safna chewing her beard." 

Sút's smile was as wicked as the long rivalry between her and her cousin.  "She knew Hylli's eye was drawn to silver when she resolved to have him.  Why she is not content with her prize, I do not know.  What can I make you?" 

Since her eye was not drawn to silver, she would have to think.  "I have not yet decided."  New ware for the table, perhaps: what she had brought out from Sulûnduban was her third best, worn thin by the heavy-handed polishing of boys.  Or a set of ale pitchers like Regin's, though his were of gold.  Clasps she might put on Rekk's jackets . . . ? 

"While you are thinking, then," Sút urged, "tell me about the Midsummer Feast.  Was Regin's new regalia much admired?  Did Thorin come?" 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Gunduzahar's company was as affable as its leader, though somewhat diffident with a newcomer, and once they had finished supper, they drew apart only to form smaller groups.  Veylin went with Rekk and the plumber to see how the baths had progressed since his departure, while the mason and the coppersmith set off to deliberate the direction of the next day's work at the mine face.  Their sons continued to debate the qualities of the stone over their pipes and the last of the ale, Nyr supported by his many cousins and the older and more authoritative Barði by his father's miners.  After long years alone on the road, Grimr found such society a heartening prospect . . . but it would take time to find his place among them, and for now he sat somewhat apart, with naught to do but gauge the character of his new companions. 

As one of the prentices—was the one with the light brown hair Haust's or Bersi's?—cleared away her empty plate, Auð rose and joined the other two women between the long table and stairway arch.  Unlike the men, they seemed mismatched, as different as gold and steel and brass, but whatever had brought them together, they soon agreed and divided again.  Bersi's spouse headed for the stair; Sút, turning her head at some mention of silver among the stone-men, drifted their way. 

Auð came towards him, stopping on the opposite side of the table.  "The meal was to your liking?" she asked. 

"Veylin's praise of the cook was just.  Bersa, is it?"  He would not mistake the man's cumbersome girth, but it was difficult to keep straight so many new names at once. 

Her smile grew wry.  "Yes, Bersa.  His cooking is all that can be praised, but when you have eaten his feast dishes, you will understand why we suffer him.  May I make you better acquainted with the delf as well?  Veylin is usually jealous of the privilege, but as you saw, he has been called away by some complication in the plumbing." 

"I should like that—but not if your brother would be displeased with you." 

That made her laugh.  "Veylin has often been displeased with me since Mother first put him in my charge; but never fear: he asked if I would take his place.  What would you like to see?  If the lads have already shown you all you require, I will not bore you." 

"No—I would enjoy seeing what you have accomplished here."  And her company as well.  Draining his stein, he pushed the bench back and stood.  "I confess," he admitted, coming around the end of the table to join her, "I did not expect anything as fine as this." 

This, their Great Hall, was not large—even that at Furnace Fells was more spacious, yet Thráin and Thorin had of necessity delved for use, while everything here might be a masterwork.  From the copper-chased doors of blackened steel opposite the archway that led towards the Main Stair to the stout seats covered in ruddy leather, ranged about the carven hearths in the aisles, there was a harmony of color and quality and style.  They had dined at one end, beneath the branching vault-ribs of dark bole-pillars, on a broad board of aged cherry, and the light cast by the many lamps was thrown back by the facing, fair as ivory, on the high walls.  Even the floor beneath their feet echoed the red and black and white above. 

When Veylin had said he wanted a man's best, he had not been speaking in platitudes.  As to paying for it . . . they could not have taken enough copper out of this hill in three years to pay for a fraction of this, not if it ran through the rock in veins of metal.  But gems—their value could be incalculable.  Was not the Heart of Erebor the Arkenstone? 

Auð gazed on it all with complacent pride.  Chieftain's daughter and gemsmith's spouse, doubtless she had never wanted for anything gold could purchase.  Yet she herself was splendid as any gem.  Had all this been made to provide a fit setting for her rich beauty?  "The hall has turned out very well," she agreed.  "As you see, it also serves as our commons, so if the lads are bothersome in your quarters, you can come here for peace.  Or there are the common-rooms on the First Deep.  One is hard by your dormitory." 

Two hearths, half a dozen chairs and a couple of settles, plus a work-scarred table: a home-like chamber, where you would not scruple to put your feet up on the furniture or polish your brass.  "Now that you are adding a gallery and baths," Grimr said, "I do not see what could be wanting." 

"More Dwarves," Auð countered, with a rueful sigh.  "Though we can hope for them, in time." 

He had grown inured to a solitary life, among Men or on the road, while she had known only the busy society of the mansion.  "When more know of what you are building, doubtless they will come."  To turn her mind from discontent, he moved towards the great arching panels of steel in the north wall.  "I have rarely seen such excellence in doors of this size.  Whose work is it?" 

"Merki, Virkr's son.  The outer doors are the hill's own stone, secret and concealed.  Feldir of Stonehaven set the locks and wards; the prentices take turns as doorward and on watch without."  Drawing the massive main bolt—the others were unset—she turned the ring on the left-hand panel and opened it enough to show the long foyer.  "I am just showing Grimr your post," she told Neðan, who glanced up from the broad slate on his lap with some surprise.  "When it is convenient, be sure he sees the Front Door, and the paths thereabouts." 

"Certainly!" the lad said, and Auð shut the door on him again. 

"This is very grand for a secret entrance," Grimr observed, running his fingers along one of the welds in the panel. 

"Veylin altered his intentions somewhat during the first year," Auð explained, leading him across the hall, "as the Men at White Cliffs proved trustworthy and they began to trade.  Now that both Men and Elves know we are here, there is some talk of clearing an open way to the Front Door.  Apparently," she sniffed, "the current approach is awkward for the Men." 

"There are Elves hereabout as well?"  He wondered what kind they were.  The remnant of the folk of Eregion in Rivendell were friendly to his kin, but the Grey Elves and the Green, and the Dwarves of the Blue Mountains, had forged undying enmity between them.  That had poisoned the hearts of many who had no part in their ancient quarrel.  Had Veylin's longfathers come from Tumunzahar or Gabilgathol? 

"A few, I am told.  There is some question, it seems, as to whether we are still in the mountains here.  Veylin has discussed the matter with the Shipwright." 

Auð's aggrieved suspicion notwithstanding—it was only natural, in a woman—that argued for Gabilgathol, since the Shipwright had been near kin to Thingol.  But he would ask one of the men for the rest of the tale, when opportunity arose.  "The Men visit you often enough to accommodate them?" 

She regarded him sidelong, eyes sharp as a faceted emerald.  "What is often?  Men seldom approach Sulûnduban.  How were such things managed in the Lonely Mountain?" 

"Dale lay between two arms of the Mountain, and there was so much commerce between us we built a road along the River Running to our Front Gate."  In memory, he could stand on that road still and hear the bells of the town below; but it was coupled with the recollection of blasted towers, shattered and fire-warped bells amid tumbled, calcined stones.  That was where Dugir had tackled him, preventing him from running across the bridge and up the road to his death.  "Men came to the Great Chamber of Thror, just within, for council or bargaining or feast more days than not, though it was uncommon for any to gain deeper admittance.  Some of us went down to Dale nearly every day, and most of our trade was conducted there." 

From the grudging tone of her "Hmm" he guessed her men's practice was in the same vein.  "Here," she directed, when they reached the stair, "the gallery is above.  I suppose they come several times a year.  At least the Lady and her escort came thrice last year, once to feast in the hall at Veylin's invitation and twice to trade.  Her kinsmen were here at the end of winter, but we will be hosting as many as will come on the roof of the mansion next month." 

"Will you?  How many Men are there?" 

"Twenty-seven, they say . . . but only a third of those are men, and many are children.  Veylin says to expect them all, but surely some will remain at home!" 

Grimr smiled at her perplexity.  She wanted better, or at least different, intelligence than her men gave her, but he was not about to gainsay the one who held his contract.  "I do not know these Men, so I cannot guess.  But if your brother says to plan for them all, I would advise you to do so.  Why was the invitation so general?" 

"They have feasted our men royally half-a-dozen times, and always make room at their table or find a cup of ale.  Their gratitude is to their credit, but it grows too one-sided," Auð complained, turning off onto the rough-finished landing where the stair ended.  "We cannot have them thinking we are obliged to them." 

"No," Grimr agreed almost at random, as he stared down the gaping throat of a tunnel driven with admirable straightness through the night-black basalt, lit only by a few widely spaced lanterns.  About halfway, some forty paces from where they stood, the walls changed, with shocking abruptness, to creamy white.  "This is the gallery?" 

Auð smiled, pleased by his wondering admiration as much as the work.  "It will be, once Nordri has quarried enough limestone.  Come," she urged, with happy anticipation, "let us go down to the First Deep and see how little work the plumber has still to do." 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**"Most Knowing of Persons"** : "That most knowing of persons—gossip."  —Seneca, _Epistles_

**Outfall sluice** : the channel that carries water from the baths off into the sewer.

**Riser** : the vertical element between two steps on a stair.

**Smock** : a shift; or a loose yoked shirt.

**Blacklock** : one of the seven kindreds of the Dwarves, whose Father awoke far to the east.  Though the four homelands of the seven kindreds were far apart—as far or further than the distance between the Blue and the Misty Mountains—none of the kindreds were isolated (HoME XII: _The Peoples of Middle-Earth_ , "Of Dwarves and Men").  Early in their history they often held joint councils at Gundobad, and more recently, all contributed significant forces to the war to avenge Thrór ( _LotR_ , App. A.III, "Durin's Folk").


	5. Fast Friends

_ Great things are done when men and mountains meet;  
_ _ This is not done by jostling in the street. _

—William Blake, _Poems from Blake's Notebook_

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Grimr had been on the Long Lake during a storm, when cresting waves had threatened to swamp the boat, but they had been a child's first tentative hammer-strokes beside this.  "Mahal," he muttered, shifting in the saddle, feeling a need for the Maker's protection.  "This is what keeps her here?" 

They had paused atop the low ridge that ran from the high white cliff to the churning, muddy-grey sea.  "As the gleam of gold keeps the miner at the face," Veylin affirmed, turning his eyes to the field of grain that filled the flat between a turf-patched ridge of sand and the talus-slope below the cliff.  "I have seen her come back from a gale-shore giddy as a courting lass, with foam in her hair." 

"Gale?" 

"Storms with winds like a torrent in spate," Nordri explained, rising in his stirrups to look back at the long train of pack-beasts climbing to join them.  "They are common in the winter months, which is why we housed the Men in the cliff.  Only stone is sure shelter against such blasts.  Nyr!  Tell the lads to picket the ponies rather than hobbling them—we cannot risk them getting into the corn." 

If it were not for the menacing throb in the air, Grimr would suspect they were trying him with tall tales.  Still, this was a mild morning, with scarce a ripple across the grass.  What must that vast expanse be like when the wind howled? 

"Would you like to see the quarry first?" Veylin asked him.  "Or go across for introductions?" 

"Go!" Nordri told them both.  "The stone will stay, until we carry it off, but the Lady may set out after berry or blossom." 

"If she is not gone already." 

The din from the sea did not drown out the doubt in the chieftain's tone, the first Grimr had heard from him.  Last night, he had been keenness itself, glad that the mason's expedition provided so prompt an opportunity to make Grimr known to his neighbors; and despite the early hour of their departure, Veylin had begun the day in cheerful mood. 

Through the leagues between, however, he and Nordri had told him the story of the fiends and Men, pointing out, as they passed it, the cairn Gaernath had raised over Thekk and Vestri.  A noble tale, full of courage and endurance—but revisiting such tragedy, even though avenged, doubtless cast a shadow on one's heart. 

"Or they may still be breaking their fast," Veylin reflected, drawing uncertainly on his broad russet beard.  "It would be rude to push in." 

The mason chuffed.  "You know you are welcome—and the ironsmith, too!  Do not cheat Grimr of a second breakfast because you are growing stout." 

It was hard not to stare at so gross a liberty, but there was no missing the ferocious glare Veylin gave the mason before kicking his pony into motion.  As his employer headed down the slope, Grimr cast his gaze about, at a loss whether to follow. 

Nordri smiled reassuringly and jerked his chin after his chieftain. 

A stream ran along the northern edge of the little plain, and he caught up with Veylin at the ford.  The way was well-worn, though it did not look as if it had seen much use of late; an untidy line of stepping stones staggered along the upstream edge.  Men's work . . . yet the field beyond gave a more favorable impression. 

"This looks more promising than anything I saw across the Lune," Grimr hazarded, when they had gone a few chains along the narrow path beaten in the short turf between the field's edge and the sandy bank of the stream.  "Spring was late, and uncommonly wet."  Part of this year's misery: some of the foulest tracks he had ever seen; clothes and boots never dry, for weeks on end. 

"Spring is always uncommonly wet here," Veylin came curtly back.  "But the sand drains." 

So it would.  "They are fortunate to have such ground.  Are they able to spare much of their crop for trade?" 

"We already take what they can spare.  Maelchon, their husbandman, has a large family, and his wife desired a house of her own, so he came to an agreement with Nordri and Grani.  You need not fear for your own profit, however: he is richer in cattle, and their cheese and butter is good." 

"And the Lady?" 

"She has many resources," Veylin said. 

Grimr returned to silence, uncertain what to make of this hash.  Should he be troubled, about the company he found himself in, or the Men?  Everything had seemed well until they crested the last rise.  Had Veylin's more familiar eye seen something that made him uneasy?  Why had Nordri goaded him so ruthlessly?  He did not know them well enough to make out the riddle, let alone the answer. 

Their way joined a broader path that came in from the left, no doubt following the water's course between the cliffs, and ran along the foot of the southern slope until it reached a rutted way climbing up, more like a winding gully than a track.  Veylin muttered under his breath as he put his reluctant pony up it, and soon Grimr's beast was snorting at the loose stones underfoot. 

"Welcome, Masters!" a voice called from above, and Grimr looked up to see a young Man with coppery hair leaning out to salute them.  "You are just in time for breakfast!  Master Veylin!  Greetings!" 

Veylin raised one hand briefly, then gripped his saddle again. 

When Grimr's mount scrabbled onto the grassy terrace below the almost sheer face of limestone, a dark-haired boy was taking Veylin's bridle and bowing.  "At your service, Master Veylin!" 

"At yours and your family's, Hanadan," Veylin answered gruffly.  "Is the Lady Saelon at home?" 

"Welcome to Habad-e-Mindon, Master," the redhead greeted Grimr very civilly, taking his pony likewise.  "I am Gaernath.  At your service!" 

The Lady's Edain cousin, who rode across fiend-infested hills to fetch assistance for her, though only a lad.  "Grimr, Linr's son, at yours and your family's."  How long it had been, since he had met Men of courtesy!  The boy Hanadan had taken Veylin's pony to a rock where the lame gemsmith could dismount more easily, rattling happily away about blueberries, so Grimr swung down from the saddle.  "Where shall I put my beast?" 

"Do not trouble yourself," Gaernath assured him.  "Hanadan will take him, with Veylin's sorrel, over there, to the cave we use as a stable."  He pointed to the larger of two openings beyond a hurdle-fenced garden.  "Did they drink at the ford, or shall he water them for you as well?" 

"That would be kind," Grimr replied.  "They did not drink." 

"Where are the cottars?" Veylin asked, drawing his blackthorn stick from its straps on his saddle. 

"Mowing hay on the river meadows.  You would have met them if you came that way.  Here, Hanadan," Gaernath ordered, holding out the reins.  "Take Master Grimr's grey as well.  Unsaddle them, and—" 

"—and when they are cool, take them to the burn to drink," the boy declared with haughty impatience.  "I know what to do!" 

"Then do it!" Gaernath told him, amused. 

"Master Veylin."  The voice behind them was less shrill than usual in the women of Men, more like a shawm than a flute.  "I am very glad to see you here." 

Turning, Grimr saw Veylin bow deeply to a barefoot woman in a patched gown of plain brown woolen.  "Lady.  You are well?" 

Was _this_ the Lady of White Cliffs? 

Her curtsey matched his bow for dignity, making her appear less like a peasant's wife.  "Very well," she assured him, smiling warmly.  "And you?  You had a pleasant Midsummer in Sulûnduban?" 

Her pronunciation was barbarous, naturally, yet the attempt itself was engaging, an effort even the Men of Dale had seldom made.  "Profitable enough," Veylin allowed, glancing back to him.  "May I introduce the newest member of our company?  Grimr, son of Linr." 

Grimr bowed low.  "At your service, Lady." 

"At yours and your family's, Master.  Will you take a cup of ale?" 

A cup of ale, a dish of blueberries and cream . . . .  The Lady's niece, far more noble in appearance, as delicately fine as any of those maids of the lordly West shielded from his sight, offered bread as well, though it was only barley bannock.  "Is the feast quite fixed for next month?" she pressed Veylin eagerly. 

"As soon as the moon is full again," he assured her, "the first fair evening.  You will come, Rian?" 

"Of course!  There is hardly music fit for dancing here, since Partalan has gone.  You Dwarves play wonderfully.  I think," the lass made a show of confiding, casting a sly glance towards a young blonde woman scraping the griddle clean by the hearth, "even Muirne may come, if you promise us music." 

"I would like that very much," the blonde hastened to agree, though she seemed bashful under the attention, "but the boys would be a bother, I am sure." 

 Veylin tutted, setting down his cup.  "We should not mind them—they could get into no mischief atop the hill—but you must do what you think best." 

"Do you think Murdag will stay at home?" Rian scoffed. 

"Meig is so little, she will stay in her basket.  Ailig, it seems, must be into everything, and now that Dornach has begun to walk—" 

"Fransag has Malmin as well," the Lady pointed out from her seat by Veylin, sounding as pragmatic as she looked.  "I am sure something can be arranged.  More ale, Master Grimr?" 

"A little, if you please."  Not too much: the day was hardly begun, and he already felt bemused, though it was the effect of hospitality rather than the ale.  When had he last met with such kindness from Men?  Years; he could count on one hand the number of Mannish thresholds he had been civilly invited to cross since the War.  Without being in the least improper, these women were extraordinarily easy, alone with two Dwarves . . . but then Veylin had supplied the roof they sat under. 

In return for the Lady's succour.  She poured for him herself.  "What brings you across the mountains, Master?  Are you, like your fellows across the way, drawn by this stone?" 

"No, Lady, though I can see why they love it.  Iron is my trade, and I understand your folk want the services of a blacksmith." 

"Very much!"  She cast a speaking glance towards Veylin, but he was drinking, and did not heed.  "When you have finished, I will take you to the hay meadows to meet Maelchon, our husbandman.  His need for ironwork is greater than ours." 

"A new pair of cloth-shears would be welcome, Aunt," Rian demurred, "and Hanadan is of an age to have a knife." 

"You have the wherewithal to make your own bargains," the Lady replied.  "Leave Hanadan's arming to me!  Scythes and sickles come first, and horseshoes next, if Master Grimr can oblige." 

"I can, Lady."  Draining his cup, Grimr rose.  "Let us go now, if your men are mowing and in need of scythes." 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

"Thank you," Saelon said. 

Veylin looked over at her from where he leaned on his blackthorn.  The cottars had gone back to their mowing; Grimr and Maelchon were deep in talk, the Man drawing on his black beard as he weighed his wants.  "I said I would find a blacksmith more amenable to you than Vitr.  I am sorry it has taken so long." 

"I hope I know better than to hurry a Dwarf!" she answered, with a smile.  "Although Master Grimr seems brisk enough." 

She smiled much; more than before.  Otherwise, the only difference visible was a thong knotted about her right wrist and her hair, neatly put up in a restrained style that spoke to him of Dírmaen's hand.  It looked very well.  "He has fallen on hard times and is eager to mend his fortunes."  There: that should be warning enough for Saelon, and fair to both of them. 

"Not entirely through us, I hope!  Our needs are grave enough, but few." 

Too true.  Grimr had not been expecting such austerity, it was plain.  Perhaps he should have said something of Saelon's simplicity as they rode hither, yet it defied explanation.  One either saw past the appearance of meanness, or one did not.  Hopefully the ironsmith, reduced by ill fate himself, would not judge hastily.  "No," Veylin assured her.  "We have work enough for him at Gunduzahar." 

"Then thank you for sparing him from his work there." 

"There is no need for thanks," Veylin replied, crossly sharp.  Why must she insist on being indebted?  "If we want your grain, we must make sure you have the tools you need to plant and harvest." 

Still she smiled.  "True enough.  What would you give for fresh blaeberries?" she wondered, sea-colored eyes suspectly bright.  "Or should I dry them and wait until your feast, to deal with Bersa?" 

That harvest required naught but a basket, and she could make those herself.  She was chaffing him.  "Would you not rather trade with Grimr?" 

"I do not think we have enough berries to buy Hanadan a knife!  No, Maelchon and Fransag's needs are greater," she said more soberly.  "I can wait.  I will take coin," she allowed, "if that is convenient." 

Veylin regarded her with narrowed eyes.  Was she in earnest, or only trying to put him in a better humour?  "Can you spare cream as well?" 

"Certainly.  Maon!" Saelon called out.  Maelchon's second son set down his hayfork and came running.  "Go to the hall," she instructed him, "and tell Murdag to set the cream in the burn to cool.  We will not make butter today.  How much will you want?" she asked Veylin, as the lad dashed away. 

How much?  A gill apiece would be more than ample for the berries, but Bersa would be displeased if there was not more for cream-cakes or some other dainty.  "Two gallons—three if you have so much." 

Saelon pursed her lips.  "I would guess I have somewhat less than two, but Fransag may be able to make it three.  Shall we go ask?" 

"Very well."  If they were to establish regular trade between their peoples, it seemed they would have to set the example. 

The day was fair and Saelon's pace unhurried, surveying the herbage on the banks with the familiar eye of one judging the ripeness of a crop.  As she paused to pluck and nibble a leaf, Veylin ventured, "Where is Dírmaen?" 

"On the south pastures with Randir, training the colts."  He must have frowned—what was it that kept Randir here, if the Men of the Star were sorely needed elsewhere?—for after a pause, Saelon asked, low, "Are you very aggrieved by my handfasting?" 

"I am not," he assured her stoutly, pained by the anxiety now on her face.  "As I said in Lothron, you must be the best judge of your own happiness.  Are you as contented as you appear?" 

He suspected she blushed, though it was hard to be sure, so brown she was from the sun; she certainly looked self-conscious.  "Yes." 

"Then I am glad."  He had no right to be otherwise.  "If I gave you cause for worry, please pardon me.  I was sorely tried the day you told me.  Indeed, all of Lothron was trying."  Veylin started down the path again.  "I had no notion Dírmaen had gained so much of your affection.  When I had last seen you, you were very wroth with him.  I believe I was chiefly astounded."  On many levels. 

"Everyone was astounded," Saelon confessed, wryly abashed.  "There is no end to my peculiarity, it seems." 

Veylin considered her sidelong.  "Your kin and folk are not displeased?" 

"That I should finally do what I ought to have done long ago?  No, Halpan gave his approval very readily, once he understood we were in earnest.  Rian is delighted.  Everyone else is exceedingly diverted.  In truth, though, I think they are pleased to have Dírmaen settled here, after what happened in Nínui." 

Not so long ago, he had considered her reckless for living apart and unprotected.  How could he now fault her for taking a spouse to defend her?  If she were inconstant, would the sea resent her infidelity?  His only concern could be the straitness of Dírmaen's defense: how jealously he would guard Saelon.  "A great reassurance, I am sure.  And Randir?  Is he settling here as well?" 

Saelon laughed.  "No, but he wishes to settle something before he departs.  He admires Rian," she generously explained when he knit his brows at the cryptic reply, " and hopes she will promise herself to him." 

The Men of the West were suddenly keen in repentance for their earlier neglect of their kinswomen.  "You approve?" 

"Randir is a good man," she allowed, "and Rian likes him . . . but no more.  She will not be of an age to wed for some years yet, and she knows she might do better.  They will dance indefatigably at your feast and then, I believe, he will go.  I may," Saelon mused, "send a couple of colts to the Chieftain with him.  They are vexing Môrfast, and it is past time I gave Argonui some token of my fealty, especially now that I have taken one of his men from him." 

Having not the slightest interest in horses, Veylin made a noncommittal sound of acknowledgment.  Silence was apt to seem disapproving.  Yet it brought to mind the other tribute she must pay.  "That reminds me: the West Council will be held in Sulûnduban this autumn.  One year is it with us, the next with the Broadbeams in Barazdush.  My custom is to take in the Havens on my way to Barazdush, so I will not be going that way before Yáviérë.  I hope that will not inconvenience you." 

In truth, he hoped it would not disappoint her; but his heart knew better, and was not displeased when her face fell.  "Oh . . . no, I do not think so, but we will miss your company.  How fortunate, that you were able to guide us on our first journey that way!" 

"Gwinnor would have seen you safely there." 

"Perhaps.  Yet what shelter could he have provided on that day of rain, when Bersi's cousin took us in?" 

Whiskers twitching with satisfaction, Veylin asked, "Have you seen Gwinnor since we left the Havens?"  Last summer, he had hardly dared look twice at rock outside the delf, lest the Noldo gemsmith spy out his lodes; now that he had time to prospect seriously, he must weigh the risk. 

"No.  Coruwi was in the oakwood a fortnight ago, however, and spoke to me as I gathered there.  His men have seen no one abroad, he said, save your folk and mine." 

Green Elves, who cared more for trees than stone, worried him less than Noldor, but they saw as keenly, and unlike Men, did not shun the night.  No doubt the marchwarden would report all he observed to Círdan. 

He must have sighed in vexation, for Saelon looked grave.  "Do they constrain you as well?" 

How had she come to be more familiar with his nearest concerns than all but a few of his own folk?  This was how water wore away stone, creeping almost imperceptibly into any crack and gradually widening the opening.  "How can I hope to profit by prospecting, with such shrewd and far-sighted neighbors?" 

She was silent for many paces, then asked, low, "Is that why you are more often at Sulûnduban?" 

Veylin stopped, halfway up the path that climbed to Maelchon's house.  "No, it is not.  Nevertheless, Saelon, you can be dreadfully discerning." 

"I know.  I cannot help it." 

"I do not suppose you can," he allowed, gazing on her with dissatisfaction.  What precisely he was unhappy with, he could not say.  Not with her: she was what she was.  If one did not like a stone, one should not meddle with it.  With Fate, perhaps, for burdening him with such awkward gifts; or with himself, for finding her so congenial.  Was there not something wrong in that, when they were of such different kinds? 

"If there is something I could do. . . ." 

So different.  She looked lightweight, ragged and frail, of no account; but she had a remarkable fund of resource and the temper of a blade.  Only a fool would spurn an ally of her mettle.  "To blind Elves to my comings and goings, in such an open land?  If you know of any such thing, tell me, and I may give you another jewel!" 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**Scythes and sickles** : a scythe is a long-bladed and long-handled tool used to mow down vegetation while standing upright, especially grass for hay; a sickle is a short-bladed and short-handled tool used to reap crops while stooping.  Death is traditionally shown with a scythe.

**Gill** : a quarter of a pint.

**Cream-cakes** : cakes filled with custard.


	6. Man to Man

__ Before I built a wall I'd ask to know  
__ What I was walling in or walling out,  
_ And to whom I was like to give offense,  
_ __ Something there is that doesn't love a wall.

—Robert Frost, "Mending Wall" 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Ducks rose from the river as they rode down from the brow of the cliff, and Randir halted Ruin to watch their wing-whistling flight downstream.  "Now that you are settled," he told Dírmaen, letting the bay pull aside to drink from a small, mossy pool where one of the many springs trickled down from the heights, "you should get yourself a hawk.  There is a nest of peregrines by the ruined tower." 

Yes, where the hill dropped sheer to the sea.  Dírmaen snorted.  "I already have a fine bird in hand.  Why should I spoil my temper with an unfledged hack?" 

His friend chuckled and sat back in the saddle.  "She does put meat on the table, I grant you, but not birds such as those.  I cannot reconcile myself to meat that must be picked from a shell, and a man can only eat so much fish and cheese." 

Remembering the summer before last, when nearly all they had was what the sea provided, Dírmaen said dryly, "Be glad Arathorn did not send you here."  He would have liked to take one of the young stags that had drifted over the hills into the high vale filled with hazels, but they would be a hundredweight heavier in another month, and in the meantime there was butter and cream aplenty.  The sweet scent of new-mown hay on the kindly breeze, and knowing Saelon would welcome him home with a cup of heather ale and more than a smile . . . .  Discontent would be ingratitude.  "You are at liberty to return to Argonui." 

"Without some assurance from Rian?" Randir reproached.  "You are growing as cruel as your lady." 

"Am I?"  Smiling, he slacked his reins so Mada could crop the lush growth where the pool spilled along the path.  "If she is anything like her aunt, absence may heighten her regard more than dogged courting." 

"Rian is nothing like her aunt," Randir insisted, with a show of mock offense.  "You slander the sweetest, noblest maid—" 

Secure in his own happiness, Dírmaen let Randir declaim, for what comfort it might give him.  He did not consider his friend's suit hopeless—how could he, after the bitter trials his own heart had suffered?—but Randir must wait to learn if he would be blessed with success, and he must leave soon.  Dírmaen was obliged that Randir had lingered here to do his duty while he healed from his wounds and dallied with his newly won and ardent wife, yet Argonui would want every Ranger as autumn, the time for brigandage, drew in . . . and it would be unwise to leave Randir here to guard Rian while he accompanied Saelon to the Havens, even if Gaernath were left behind for propriety's sake.  Dírmaen understood the temptations too well. 

Idly, he considered the muddy patch in the beaten path, guessing who had passed between Maelchon's and the hall under the cliff by the marks left since yesterday's rain.  The boys, of course, coming and going, the prints of their bare feet deep from the spring of their running; Maon, it seemed, as well as Hanadan and Guaire.  That set not much larger but walking sedately was probably Unagh going to visit her sister.  Their own horses setting out— 

And smaller hoofprints, the steady trot of dwarf-ponies.  Two, lightly burdened, headed up-river, not down to the cliff-quarry. 

"What is it?" Randir asked, breaking off as Dírmaen leaned down from the saddle to scan the ground more closely. 

"We have missed visitors, it seems." 

Tracking was not one of Randir's talents, yet even he could read hoofprints aright.  "Dwarves!  Who, I wonder?  I hope," he rushed on earnestly, "there is no bad news about the feast.  Rian would be disappointed." 

No, those were not Unagh's prints; there in the firmer soil, Dírmaen saw the mark of a scar on one heel, a curved ridge he knew very well, having often traced it in the dark despite the wriggling of the foot.  Beside them a small pair of hobnailed boots had walked, skirting the mud and treading unevenly.  More weight on the left, and when he sought it, Dírmaen saw the slight mark of a stick on the right. 

Veylin.  Afoot beside Saelon here between her folks' dwellings, where there were none to see. 

Dírmaen felt the old jealousy stir, a dragon troubled amidst its sated sleep.  He had won Saelon, or at least the fullest opportunity to prove he would serve her well, and save for the fixed term of their irregular bond, she had given herself unreservedly to him in return.  To know her was joy, and fulfillment unexpected, whose light he saw reflected back upon him from her shining eyes when he held her in his arms. 

Yet there was one intimacy they did not share: confidence in the inscrutable dwarf-lord who was her neighbor, as russet and as crafty as any fox.  Dírmaen respected Veylin, but he did not trust him, while Saelon treasured the Dwarf's counsel more than the princely sea-jewel he had given her, in payment of a debt neither would explain.  Dwarves were queer folk, unfriendly, thrawn as their native stone, yet Saelon treated the dwarf-lord as though he were a kinsman. 

And Veylin responded in kind.  Having a better claim to kinship with the lady, Dírmaen had frowned on their familiarity as soon as it came to his attention . . . and ever the more as his own misprized regard for Saelon grew, until it became the greatest impediment to his suit.  Her friendship with the Dwarf was a rock, upon which he could only come to ruin.  Without clear sign of peril, it were best to steer clear. 

Had they gone aside with intent, or did he misread innocent acts from animosity?  Saelon had more than once charged that he was too ready to see ill where none was purposed.  A useful error in a Ranger, who must ever be vigilant, but not so pardonable, perhaps, in a husband.  Dírmaen dearly desired to be wedded to Saelon in truth as well as act, to be bound by the noble metal of rings rather than the rude thong of their handfasting, close about his left wrist. 

But only if she would be true.  Some reserve he thought he could bear, but not dishonesty. 

Kicking free of his stirrups, he swung his leg over and slid down Mada's shoulder, flinging the reins to Randir, who caught them, startled.  "I will take the short road and find out!  Lead Mada around for me, will you?" 

"Of course." 

Was that unease, fleeting across his friend's face?  Randir knew of his rivalry with Veylin.  No matter.  Dírmaen loped along the track to the faint trace that led up to the near end of the cliff, so steep even the boys seldom trod it.  He must know how things stood between him and his lady, to check this poison if he were unjust. 

Up he went, striding at first, then clambering, using hands as well as feet to climb towards the scant end of the cliff-shelf, a mere ledge just large enough for a man on watch.  Why would Veylin be afoot, lame as he was, rather than ride?  Had he come with just one companion, or were there three of them?  Surely Veylin had not walked all the way from his halls—  As he paused to snatch an extra breath, Dírmaen twisted to gaze towards the other cliff, where Nordri cut the fine white stone he loved.  Yes, there were ponies there, grazing on the slope between cliff and corn.  They must have come across the lower ford. 

His brain worried at the puzzle of what Dwarves where until he could no longer spare thought, the last, steepest stretch requiring all his attention, for hand- and footholds were few, and the grass so thin it was no sure anchor.  A clump of low heather, the treacherous temptation of a thorny young whin; chalky dust drifted up into his face as his foot slid, ploughing the loose earth below. 

One last heave, and he cast himself onto the ledge like a beached salmon, gasping almost as desperately.  Mad; he was mad, to scramble after her like this.  What would the cottars think, when they saw him come this way?  For they were more likely to be working in the open air than Saelon, and there was no secret way into the hall that would let him take her unawares.  Who was sneaking now? 

Suddenly ashamed, Dírmaen rose and paced softly along the curve of white stone, peering to see who was out of doors, hoping that there would be none, so he could meet Randir and the horses.  An empty saddle would occasion more curiosity than he had considered, and he was on probation with Saelon's folk as much as the lady herself. 

No one.  Praise be, his foolishness need not be exposed.  Hastily he strode across the widening turf, making directly for the beaten ground at the top of the track.  He was halfway there when someone straightened up in the kail-patch, hand reaching to ease their back.  Like a startled buck, Dírmaen froze at gaze . . . and the pounding of his heart changed tenor as he recognized the supple arch of Saelon's slender body above the wattle fencing. 

A fortnight's possession had in no way glutted him.  Nut-brown nape, the slow, stretching shrug of her shoulders—he did not know whether to be glad her back was to him or to regret it.  Perfectly still he stayed, until she bent back to her weeding, and then he crouched, going low and wary as any wolf, Mada's empty saddle forgotten.  Somehow he got across the space between them undetected and, hunkering down in the slight covert of the wattle, Dírmaen heard her humming the roundelay that kept springing to his lips in this season of bliss. 

Blood turned to water, or to fire, he reached over the woven hazel-stems and took the sweet roundness of her haunches in his hands. 

With the shriek of an outraged falcon, she sprang upright, whipping around in an otter's close curve, weed-filled hand raised to smite.  Yet her eye was as quick as her temper, and what fell on his ducking head was more of a cuff than a clout.  "Beast!" she accused, sea-storm eyes glinting.  "Have you no shame?" 

"Not when there is none to see," he assured her, rising to take her in his arms.  He loved her light fierceness, and with her blood roused by his ambuscade, their kiss lasted until hooves clattered up the track. 

He had hoped Randir would hurry; now he heartily wished he had dawdled on the way, or that one of the horses had picked up a stone, anything to delay him, for Saelon drew away, cheeks flushed beneath her tan.  "Did you fly here?" she asked with acerbic wonder, cocking a brow at Mada on a leading rein as Randir halted the horses and grinned at them. 

"Like an arrow," Randir answered on his behalf.  "It was all I could do to keep him from plunging from the cliff-top into your arms." 

Saelon rolled her eyes, as she did when the boys were especially rampant.  "How the Chieftain holds the West when he is served by fools such as you, I cannot understand.  Go on," she commanded, "see to your horses, for supper will be ready soon.  You had best duck your head in the burn," she told Dírmaen, brushing dirt and a lingering stem of goose-grass from his hair more tenderly than she spoke, "or I will be ashamed to sit by you.  We have invited Nordri and his men to come for ale when they are done their day's work." 

"As you wish," Dírmaen murmured, though mention of the Dwarves brought his earlier misgivings to mind again.  Yet hospitality was a woman's duty, as war was a man's, and Nordri was a good neighbor in his own right.  It would be churlish indeed to grudge a cup to one who lost a son slaying _raugs_ in Srathen Brethil.  "Have they any fresh news?" 

She hesitated.  "Nordri, no"; and bent back to her weeding.  "Veylin stopped by this morning, however, to introduce the blacksmith who has joined their company.  Grimr is his name, and Maelchon has already bespoken two new scythes." 

"Can he shoe horses?" Randir asked, direct to his own concerns. 

"So he says.  He will be back the day after tomorrow with the scythes, and tend Whitefoot then." 

Dírmaen grunted.  Scythes and farriery would be very welcome, if the work were good.  "They did not stay?"  Two ponies, taking the river track to Maelchon's and not returning hither.  If she was loath to speak of Veylin before him, he had given her cause. 

"As the scythes are wanted now, Grimr did not linger; Veylin went to show him the way by the upper ford." 

"Well then," Randir said, swinging down from Ruin, "we will have to wait a day or two to meet the newcomer.  Did he have any news from beyond the Lune?" 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

"Beyond the Lune?  The harvest will be late," Grimr told the one who called himself Randir, as he drove in the pins to firmly fix the scythe blade to the handle.  "Only once have I seen a wetter, later spring in the years since I came west.  We will hope summer lingers as well.  Here."  He offered Leod the scythe.  "Is that better?" 

The young Man, hair bleached pale as tow from his work in the sun, swung it by way of trial, lopping a patch of nettles.  "Aye, that will do," he allowed, with no sign of satisfaction. 

"Off with you, then!" Maelchon charged him.  "With blades so sharp, you and Finean should finish the upper slope today.  And take care not to dunt it on the rocks, or the heifer calf I promised you will pay for mending it." 

Leod shouldered the scythe and did as he was ordered, at no great pace, sullenness plain for any to see on his beardless face.  Stooping to pick up the old scythe blades, Grimr wondered how much ill will lay between master and man.  No such warning had been given to the older fieldhand, who had tried his new tool with a workman's appreciation.  Yet the greybeard perched on an upturned tub, mending a wooden hay-fork with gaunt, crabbed hands, seemed little troubled by either admonition or sloth, and he was the blond's grandsire. 

"Came west?" the sociable Man of the Star repeated.  "The Blue Mountains are not your home?" 

Grimr shook his head.  "I dwelt in the Lonely Mountain, beyond the Great River, until a dragon fell on us.  Do you wish to keep these," he asked the farmer, "or shall we consider the metal part of your payment?"  It was indifferent iron, but would serve well enough for barrel hoops. 

Maelchon drew on his black beard, weighing the matter with grave deliberation.  "I will keep them," he decided.  "They will do for my sons to start with." 

Four scythes would mow more than two; so a man burdened with debt ought to reason.  "Once I have shod the horse, I will see what I can do for their temper."  Beating out the worst nicks and properly hardening the iron would be a small thing. 

"Thank you, Master.  Shall I fetch the beast?" 

It lounged, hoof-cocked, in the pen nearby, as tall and brawny as a dray-horse of Dale.  "Not yet.  Let me get the fire hot."  Hopefully the animal would be as even-tempered as its owner.  He had shod horses, but none so large as this. 

Once the firebox was set up and he was arranging the coals, the other Man of the Star asked, "When did you come to Eriador?  After your great war with the Orcs?" 

Grimr looked up at the Man.  Dírmaen, this one was called.  He was more taciturn than his comrade, one who listened before he spoke.  "Yes.  The Dunlendings grew unfriendly." 

The whispered talk between the two boys, the eldest of the children gathered to stare at the strangeness of him and his work, suddenly flared into open argument.  "Rock doesn't burn!" the sturdier of the two, Maelchon's boy, declared, as if speaking to a lackwit. 

"Coal does," Hanadan maintained with equal scorn.  "Wait, and you will see!" 

"Then it must be magic," the first replied, the curt dismissal shaded with unease. 

"It is not—Master Grimr," the Lady's young kinsman appealed, "is not coal peat that has been pressed hard?" 

Grimr sat back on his heels, flint and steel in his hands, and considered the boy curiously.  "It is."  But what Man could have told him so? 

Maelchon's son drew close enough to take up a piece of the good hard coal that gleamed like glass, and stared at it.  "What could turn peat into this?" he asked, dubious, almost suspicious. 

Hanadan answered, "The weight of the earth.  Remember the stone-shell that Master Veylin found in our cliff?  It is like that." 

"Shells are already hard." 

"Enough!" Maelchon rebuked them, taking the coal from his son's hand and setting it back in the sack.  "Such things are Dwarves' business, Guaire, none of yours.  If you will not let Master Grimr work in peace, I will find you work of your own." 

Once he had lit the tiny shavings of tinder, Grimr considered Hanadan, trading sharp elbows and hissed recriminations with the farmlad.  Children were the truest test of a community's temper, for they followed their elders without circumspection.  By that measure, Veylin's confidence in his neighbors did not seem misplaced.  Their numbers were pitifully few, true, and their wealth no more than could be expected among those recently driven from their long-homes.  They were ragged . . . but there were no starvelings, none of the frail, sickly children so common among poor Men.  Food they had, and food Gunduzahar wanted.  Their commerce might be limited until Maelchon's sons had industrious sons of their own, but Thyrnir and Thyrð—and Nyr, and Barði—might find their labors well repaid.  His debt, however, was unlikely to be paid off as swiftly as he wished. 

Once the fire was well-established, Grimr set the iron for the shoes in the edges to heat and took up the nippers and hoof-knife.  "Bring the horse," he told Maelchon, steeling himself. 

The beast came placidly, the farmer crooning to it as if it were a babe and stroking its neck as it snuffed at Grimr.  Apparently it recalled their brief meeting two days ago, for it looked more dubiously at the fire, even as he ran his hand down its thick, hairy fetlock and lifted a plate-like foot to rest on his thigh.  They had trimmed its hooves as well as they could, Maelchon had told him, shamefaced; and indeed, it was a shameful job. 

Yet they had not the tools to do better.  How should he, bereft of his own, fault them for that? 

By the time he had rasped all four hooves to clean, level arcs, the iron was ready to forge.  The fascination his work had for Men he never understood: they would stand and watch him beat and bend, hour after hour, and to what profit?  The children's wonder was natural enough, but grown men, who ought to have their own work to do, seemed equally transfixed by the sparks that flew as he welded the white-hot bar iron.  It was not as though they sought to learn the trade, for they could recall little of what he did afterwards.  Yet still they stared at the glowing metal as if bespelled.  Perhaps that was why they called it magic. 

All went well until he crouched, almost beneath the beast's belly, and laid the first shoe on hot.  The fit was fine, but the horse tossed its shaggy head and heaved its foot from his bent knee and grip, snorting at the stink of singed horn and hair.  "Hou, hou," Maelchon soothed hastily, tightening his hold on the halter as Grimr leapt clear of stamping hooves, striving to keep the smoke-wreathed metal on the tips of his tongs from any flesh.  "Do not mind the smell, lass.  It will not hurt you." 

"Has the beast never been shod before?" Grimr demanded, quickly setting the shoe beside the hearth to cool, lest they see how his heart was hammering through a trembling of the tongs.  Three more to fit, and all four to fasten: what would the creature do when he started hammering the nails? 

"Oh, aye," the farmer replied, as earnest to reassure him as the horse, "she has.  But not in that way.  Our smith did not see any benefit to setting hot metal on hoof, though Lord Halladan insisted on it for his mounts." 

Grimr's opinion of their former smith fell further still.  "Should I fit the others cold, then?"  The bed for the shoe would be neither as close nor as clean, yet if Maelchon did not value such things, why should he risk life and limb for them? 

"If it will be less trouble, Master—" 

"The heat will drive out the damp," Dírmaen said with abrupt authority, stepping to bearded Man's side.  "Give me her head, Maelchon, and you can hold her feet for Master Grimr.  She will not kick you." 

"Kick?"  The farmer seemed astonished that the horse could be suspected of vice.  "Nay, she did not kick when we carved away at her feet, sore as they were; she will not kick now." 

"She knows us well," the Man of the Star replied.  "Come!  Your hands will reassure her, and the less she is frighted, the easier this will be in the future." 

The same might be said for him.  Grimr gave Dírmaen a curt bow of thanks as Maelchon bent to lift the other forefoot, then turned to take the next shoe from the coals. 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**Hack** : a hack-hawk is a bird taken from the nest as an eyass, before it fledged, and kept in a hack-house at partial liberty to master flight and strengthen its wings before training.  Since they had not already learned to take prey, they were trying to train, though easier to tame.

**Roundelay** : a kind of song; simple, with a repeated refrain.

**Goose-grass** (or cleavers; _Galium aparine_ ): a weedy plant with clingy prickles (it cleaves to things) that has many medicinal uses.  It is also a good food for geese, and can be used to curdle milk to make cheese.

**Tow** : flax-fiber, especially the shorter, coarser strands used as stuffing or to make twine.

**Hay-fork** : also known as a pitchfork; this is used to turn grass drying for hay and to move the finished hay.

**The Great River** : the Anduin.


	7. Of Moon and Men

_             "Tis ever common  
_ _ That men are merriest when they are from home. _

—William Shakespeare, _Henry V_ , I, ii

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

"Here they come!"

Auð put the meat-forks Barði insisted the Men would not use back into his hands.  "Very well—but leave them where they can be quickly found if they _are_ wanted!"  Hastening to the gentle southern slope of their rooftop lawn, she joined the others who had gathered at Thyrnir's call.  "How many are there?" she asked anxiously.  Too few would be as bad as too many now, for the food was prepared and must be eaten.

"A score at least," Thyrnir assured her, climbing down from his perch on a dark spur of rock.  He had the sharpest eyes among them.  "I do not see Canand or the fellow who keeps their dogs, or Tearlag."

She did not remember a Tearlag.  Auð shook her head; if they were not at the Men's Spring Day feast, they must be of no account.  "All of the women have come?"  Shading her eyes against the lowering sun, she peered over the edge of the tableland.  There—a train of horses and Men, coming up by the dale that led to the shore, rather than down along the track.

"Where the Lady leads, who would not follow?" Sút asked dryly, and drained her stein.

"Many!" Rekk flung back with a laugh.  "Thyrnir, is that Halpan, there beside Rian?"

It might be.  The Dúnedain made a little cavalcade, and their men were as alike as needles: long and slim and dark-headed, all clad in shades of grey.  The splash of sea-beryl blue at the front would be the Lady; the truer cobalt just behind, steely guardians on either hand, Rian.  Then came the common Men, afoot, though two—one was Maelchon, that she could see—led strapping horses laden with packbaskets.  Was that one of the small children, perched on the beast's high back?  Gaernath, also mounted, brought up the rear of the train; there was no mistaking the fiery blaze of his hair.

"Is the Dunlending there as well?" Veylin asked.

Auð cast a discreet glance towards her brother.  His pleasure in this feast was not unalloyed, she knew, since the Lady had given her hand to Dírmaen . . . but she wondered if he misunderstood how deeply his friend had committed herself.  In the spring he had spoken, with heart-wrenched candor, of marriage and union; yet the other men spoke only of betrothal.  He appeared at ease now, the heel of his game leg resting on a low boulder, pipe in hand.

"No," Thyrnir assured him, then added, "Rian will miss his harping."

Rekk snorted into his stein.  "You will miss the chance to put down your fiddle while he plays!  Go on—take whomever Bersa can spare, and help our guests get their goods up the hill."

Grimr, however, lingered.  "What Dunlending do you speak of?"

"Partalan is his name," Veylin told him, knocking the dottle from his pipe.  "A surly fellow, like most of his breed, but a rare hand with blade and harp.  He it was who rammed the mother of fiends with his horse.  Yet since he will quarrel with all—Dwarf, Elf, or Man of the Star—save the folk of Srathen Brethil, the Lady has sent him there to guard those who have returned.  We see him seldom now."

With a nod of thanks, Grimr went after the other hired men and prentices.

"Why did she not simply dismiss him, if he is so troublesome?" Sút asked.

Rekk stared at her.  "You are harsh.  Where is such a Man to find employment, if not with those he has bled for?"

"Dunlendings readily find pay if they are quick with their swords, or so I have heard."

"If they do not care who hires them," Veylin said curtly, setting his foot down and thrusting his stick into the turf as he stumped to the edge of the lawn.  "Welcome, Lady!" he bellowed, with hearty good cheer.  "A fine day you have had for your journey!"

"Well met!  Indeed, we have," Saelon replied, "and a fine night we will have, too!"

"So it is to be hoped!" Rekk answered, with a grin.  "Congratulations, Lady!  You have bent that Man of the Star to your will, I hear."

"Or he has bent me to his!"

"That is not likely," the waterwright chaffed.

Watching the Lady and Dírmaen tread the narrow track, hand in hand together, Auð thought they appeared well matched . . . and well content, in a way that argued for Veylin's understanding of their bond.  The Man of the Star was better dressed than she had ever seen him before—that must be Rian's work, the linen severely plain but very well cut—and for once there seemed no shadow on the Lady's mood.  If the Lady could jest about subordination, plainly she did not feel oppressed.

Seeing the jovial, eager faces of the Men coming up to meet them, Auð felt in her bones that the feast would be a success.  It did not matter that some of them, particularly the women with babes in arms, looked somewhat fatigued already: pale summer ale and a few of Bersa's trifles would recruit their strength for talk and trade, debate and dancing, the convivial pleasures of the night.

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

"Would you be willing to come to Srathen Brethil?" Halpan asked Grimr, face glowing with earnest hope as much as drink in the light of the soaring bonfire.  "Even a week of your time would be a great help.  What the _raugs_ did not rend, the reivers stole."

Reaching for the jug, Grimr topped up his stein—and the young Man's.  "How far is it to Srathen Brethil?"  This was the pleasantest feast he had been to in years; decades, perhaps.  The food had been magnificent: cold ham and smoked trout, crisp brown potato cakes and a gratin of leeks, pickled onions and beetroot and a great salad dressed with bacon, finished with flakey honey pastry and a brambleberry cobbler as dark as the sky above.  The company, if possible, was even better.

"Two days, at most," Halpan assured him.  "One in the summer, if the weather has been fair.  We can provide you with a guide, to speed your journey."

Wrapping his hands around his mug, Grimr asked, "Would you pay in coin or cattle?"

Before the Man could answer, Rian swept up to their table, seizing her cousin by the arm.  "Your pardon, Master Grimr," she cried breathlessly, "but Halpan _must_ dance."

"Why?" the young Man protested, as she hauled him from the bench.  "You should have men enough.  _You_ cannot want for a partner, since Randir is here!"

The lass huffed in exasperation.  "Leod swears he has danced enough, and Murdag wants a partner.  Gaernath is unwilling—"

"Sensible lad!"

"—and Gormal is too green for her.  Come!  She will be flattered, and you can change with Artan after this reel."

"Think on it, until I return!" Halpan begged Grimr, as he was carried off.

Grimr chuckled and took a swig of ale.  Formidable women, these ladies of White Cliffs.  Once the cup of welcome was drunk, Rian had chaffered long and spiritedly with Auð, the board between them strewn with the woolen she had brought, bolts of linen, packets of broidery thread, and scraps of cloth Auð proffered as samples of what she wanted.  Very creditably the lass did, too, for the tailor was as shrewd as she was handsome.  Indeed, Grimr wished Auð less knowing, for vivid silk and fine-drawn wire had tempted Rian to spend her profit on finery rather than new cloth shears.

Taking the last piece of honey pastry from the platter, he snorted at his own greed.  Not two months ago he had been pathetically grateful for black bread and sour ale, feast-day largesse from strangers, and now he belonged to a rich and affable company.  The work was, as Veylin had warned, dull, and it was galling to rank nearly as low as the prentices, but when it began to be intolerable, he could ride to White Cliffs with a handful of harness rings or a new-forged knife and have his sense of consequence restored.  To be called "Master" instead of, peremptorily, "Dwarf"—or worse; to be sure of a cup of good ale and a tasty morsel . . . how different these Men were from those in the rest of Eriador!  Were they of a different breed, distant kin to the Men of Dale, or was their amity but a happy chance amid the ill fates of the world, perversely forged by mutual foes?

As for the bother of bargaining with Bersa occasioned by their lack of coin, that was repaid by Auð's pleasure when he returned with a brace of fat geese or a tub of new cheese.  Sucking the honey's sticky sweetness from his thumb, Grimr gazed along the tables to where she sat beside Nordri, sketching something for him on the wood with a charred stick from the fire.

He did not like to see her here, under the open night sky.  She should be keeping Hlin, Bersi's spouse, company below, in the security of the delf, and have left her trading to Rekk or her sons.  From talk in the common-room or riding the paths to and from White Cliffs with Nordri's quarrymen, he gathered she had been led to such indiscretion little by little.  Removing from Sulûnduban was seen as a noble sacrifice of her own comfort to her sons' education and interest, especially by Nordri and his son, who wished they could entice their own wives to join them in Gunduzahar.  She had first met Men when the Lady Saelon came to Gunduzahar, a most peculiar circumstance itself—Grimr could not remember any women of Men entering the Lonely Mountain—but what harm could come from two women meeting, especially in the safety of their own deep-delved halls?

So rockslides started, a few pebbles rattling down a slope.  And then Sút had come.

He was not the only one uncomfortable with the silversmith.  Most of the men were uncertain of how they should treat her.  She was a member of the company, but there was precious little scope for her craft.  The mine did not produce enough silver to interest her.  She did not trade with them; she was not kin to them; nor was she interested in marriage.  The Firebeards felt vaguely responsible for her, since her father had been a cousin of their king, and the rest left her to them with a sense of grateful relief.

Sút it was, he had been told, who insisted on visiting White Cliffs, shortly after brigands attacked the Men—to assure herself of her security, she said!—and convinced her friend to attend the Spring feast there.  And this feast repaid that one.

How had Auð, excellent as she was, come to keep so reckless a friend?  Was there some bond of debt between them?  He could not believe it was a sympathy of spirit.  Why ever would she allow the unruly woman to involve her in obligations that exposed her to danger?

"Why are you all alone?"

With a start, Grimr turned to find Sút standing beside him.  "Halpan's kinswoman required him," he replied with a smile, hoping it would satisfy her.  He ought not to have brooded on her when she was nearby.  Like naming, it called.

Sút gazed on the couples rollicking in a wide, interweaving circle, lips pursed.  "It is good they get some use from him.  You have been much among Men," she said, settling onto the bench and topping up her stein from the jug.  "Are all their women as independent as these?"

This was what he did not like: her wry, over-familiar tongue and questions that were difficult to answer decently.  "No.  The Men of the West in particular are very careful with their women."

Brow dubiously aslant, she challenged, "Then how did Saelon come to dwell alone at White Cliffs?"

Since he did not know, Grimr did not answer.

"Well, she seems to have allied herself advantageously in the end," the silversmith continued, ignoring the reproof of his silence.  "Yet it seems very peculiar.  When I first came, but half a year ago, all the talk was of how much she and Dírmaen disagreed."

That was so: Grimr remembered the surprise that greeted the news of their handfasting in the hall.  Watching Saelon and Dírmaen in the dance, however, it was hard to believe.  Their hands clung to each other to the very fingertips, and came back together like lodestones.  Yet if misaligned, lodestones also repelled each other.

"I sometimes wonder," Sút mused aloud, "whether the Lady's healing arts have the power to enchant, for all who have been in her hands incline towards her."  And so saying, she looked directly at the high table, where Veylin sat drinking his wine and watching his guests dance.

Since he did not have to meet her eyes, black and fathomless as the sky above, Grimr stared at her.  He had dismissed the insinuations of unwonted affection between Veylin and the Lady Saelon as mutters of resentment: of the chieftain's troves of gems and metal, and of the time he devoted to them, rather than to his folk in Sulûnduban.  Envy was inevitable, and the latter a legitimate grievance—but for such talk to come from the boon companion of Veylin's own sister!  Was this some test of his fidelity to his employer?  "I have never heard of such sorcery," he replied, blunt yet grudging.  "Is not gratitude an adequate explanation?"

"When the obligation has been repaid?"

If he was too brusque, she might tarnish his reputation with Auð, easily.  "Can one be sure a debt has been discharged without seeing the reckoning?"

He was saved from further trying by the end of the dance.  Halpan staggered back, Unagh hanging, breathless, on his arm.  "Ale!" the Man demanded giddily.  "Give me ale!"

Grimr handed him his stein, and once he had drained it, promptly poured more.  "Thank you," Halpan panted, passing the mug to his partner, who drank as thirstily.

"I will fetch more," Grimr offered, glad duty permitted him to withdraw without dishonor.  There was something queer about Sút, he reflected on his way to the cask; queerer even than her wantonness.  Was that why her kinsmen had abandoned her?

It was none of his business.  He had seen too much madness in the days since the dragon fell on the Mountain; too many lives twisted and broken by the ill of the world.  All he wanted, since Heilsa was gone, was peace enough to ply his craft, so he might earn a few homely comforts to ease his longer journey to the halls of Mahal.  Sending the full pitcher back in Balnar's hands, Grimr found a seat by Rekk, who readily told him all he knew of Srathen Brethil.

The great lamp of the moon climbed to the vault of heaven, plating all with silver that was not near the ruddy gold of flame.  They danced and sang, each folk in their own manner; the boys threw sticks into the bonfire as if they were spears, sending sparks up to rival the stars.  The nearest approach to a quarrel was when Halpan and Ingi disagreed in their telling of the Battle of the Tarn, but Rekk and Dírmaen quelled the embranglement before younger, quicker tempers could flare.  Another cask was broached; little mincemeat pies and spirit-soaked plumcakes went round; the musicians took up their instruments once more.

Yet as the moon rolled back down, the Men began to flag.  Fransag and Muirne were the first, dozing off beside their sleeping children; then the greybeard and the steady-drinking men that kept him company, heads pillowed on ale-soaked boards.  The grass flat beneath their stamping, spinning feet, four remaining couples defied night and sleep with a vigor that suggested they would go on until dawn . . . but around the second hour, the Lady gave over, settling down at the high table beside Dírmaen with an expression of happy fatigue.  The younger Men carried bravely on, but the pattern of their dances was thin and soon Unagh dropped out as well.  And so the dancing came to an end, and they moved into the mellowest part of the night.

Released from playing, the musicians set upon the remaining ale and cakes, and conversation rallied briefly, but how much could one say of the coming harvest without tempting fate?  The bonfire was allowed to die, and prentices began quietly clearing deserted tables and putting out their lamps.  Seeing Haki and Gamal drain their steins and move off into the darker night, Grimr considered heading for his own bed.  Aðal and Vigr were gone; Prut as well.  Those who were friendliest to the Men were entertaining the stalwarts, and Grani desired another score of spikes as soon as might be.  Even with a late start, he might get through half a dozen—

"Grimr," Oski murmured, as he set down his tray and began piling on crockery, "I do not suppose you would help us?  Thyrnir and Balnar and the others who played have been excused from this, so we are dreadfully short-handed."

"Certainly.  Is there another tray?"  He owed the lad for his good word with Veylin.

"Atop the empty cask."

"I do not know why I am telling you this," Grimr heard Veylin say, as he walked past the high table.  "Knowing you, you will follow the shore as close as you can."

"All the way around Forlindon?" Dírmaen scoffed, pouring himself more wine.  "Yours was much the shorter way."

"I would prefer fewer mountains," the Lady replied.  "If I must ride pillion."  From her tone, this was a matter of debate.

Knowing somewhat of her temper already, Grimr took his tray to the lower tables, past Maelchon and Artan talking to Grani about a supply of ash-wood, voices low so as not to disturb their slumbering families, and on to where the sots had early surrendered to drink.  There were fewer dishes here; and while the boards would require extra scrubbing, that would be a job for whichever junior prentice was in most disfavor tomorrow.

He had thought he was alone save for the insensible, but as he dumped someone's crusts from their plate to the grass—the crows would feast once the Men were gone—the moon glinted off the dark, humped shape that shifted at the end of the next table.  "What a thirst you have!" he heard Sút murmur, as he recognized the silver braid that edged her black hood, its cape lifting with her arm.  "Here, lass—let me fill that for you."

"Thankee," came the slurred reply.

Moving around the end of the table and stacking bowls as if he had not heard, Grimr angled his head to see who the silversmith was drinking with.  One of the women of Men, when she herself was dressed as a man, and all but alone?  That was imprudent, if not unseemly.  One of Finean's daughters; from the styling of her now-disordered hair, Murdag, Leod's wife.

Lips tight with disapproval, Grimr gathered up the dishes as quickly as he could without drawing attention.  It was bad enough that a mother with a nursing babe should be drunk, but to give her more!  Whatever mischief this was, he wanted no part of it.

"Has the night been so unpleasant you would drown the memories?" Sút wondered.

"M' husband has.  Why shouldna I?"  Murdag gave a feeble, petulant shove to the snoring lout by her side.  "Loon . . . one night o' fun, an he wouldna dance!"

"Why did you marry him, if he was not obliging?"

"Och, he was willin' enough afore," the woman of Men grumbled.  "Men are fair fine whan wooin'.  Mibbe—" she raised her head to gaze towards the higher tables "—mibbe I should hae gone wi' Gaernath."

Sút topped up Murdag's mug again.  "Did he offer?  He is kin to your Lady, is he not?"

"Aye."  There seemed to be regret in her silence; then she swept it away with a harsh, "But who wants a great ganglin' boy?"  There was a pause as Murdag drank deep.  "I wish," she muttered, "I hae been as canny as Saelon."

"In what way?"

"I should hae tried Leod ferst.  If we hae been handfastit, I could hae put him off come harvest."

"You were not betrothed before you married?"

Murdag snorted into her mug.  "Ye think thae two are betrothit?"

Sút went still, as Grimr did himself.  "The Lady and Dírmaen are not affianced?" the silversmith said, very low.

"Affi—?"

"Pledged to marry."

If a giggle could be lewd, Murdag's was.  "Only if he pleesures her beyon' Midsummer next."

"I do not think I understand you.  They are still wooing?  They are not promised to each other?"

"Hoots, how daft youse Dwarves can be!  But than ye hae no wemen," Murdag allowed, gazing on Sút with a drunk's maudlin pity.  "Thae are marrit, but only fir a year an a day."

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Notes

**"spoke only of betrothal"** : "handfasting" is normally a betrothal or engagement.  The good folk of White Cliffs, though perfectly ready to chaff their Lady and Dírmaen on the vulgar unconventionality of their trial marriage, are less willing to expose them to their neighbors' ridicule.

**Waterwright** : this is a term of my own invention for a hydraulic engineer, a craftsman who makes things like dams, mill races, cisterns, and fountains.  Water moves through rock, and not only there are places you want it to go, there are places you _don't_ want it to go.  This is not the same thing as a plumber, who works in lead, _plumbum_ : that's the guy who makes the pipes.

**Lodestones** : magnetized hematite, a form of iron ore.  Like a lode-star, they can show the way (i.e., act as a compass.)

**The Battle of the Tarn** : the slaying of the fiends/ _raugs_ in Srathen Brethil.

**"the second hour"** : the other Peoples of Middle-earth reckon the start of the day from either sunrise or sunset, but I have Dwarves reckon time from the less seasonally variable midnight and noon.


	8. Strings to Your Bow

_ "Now at last," the Master broke in, "the bowstring has cut right through you." _

—Eugen Heurtgel, _Zen in the Art of Archery_

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Hands full of Saelon's hair, marten-dark, smelling of myrtle and the musk of their love, Dírmaen asked, "Where are you going today?" 

"To the burn of two rowans," she answered, and turned her head enough to cock a sly eye at him.  "Might I see you there, around midday?" 

There were benefits, he had discovered, to wedding a woman long neglected.  "Later would suit me better.  I must wait for Grimr before I set out, and what Halpan says of conditions across the mountains makes me uneasy about our eastern march."  He would push up into the hills, then circle to the south to meet her.  There was a pool by the rowans . . . after they returned from the Havens, the sun would no longer have the strength to warm its clear waters. 

Saelon straightened again, so his plaiting would not be crooked.  "What is your business with Grimr?" 

"I have bespoke a dozen new arrowheads."  Despite his care, a few had been lost, and this rocky land was unkind to the stray shot.  It would be good to have heads that were straight and true for hunting this autumn and winter; and if he must draw on lawless men, better still. 

"You have the wherewithal to trade?"  Saelon sounded surprised, as if she had never considered his resources before. 

Smiling, he turned her thick braid into a knot and pinned it in place before kissing the top of her head.  "I would not have bespoke them if I did not." 

It was as well he had finished, for she twisted around to face him.  "Coin?" 

There was that sharpness in her face that was hard to interpret: was she avid, or displeased that he had not told her?  "A little.  Enough for such necessities.  Rangers cannot carry goods to barter with." 

The short huff of her clipped laugh reassured him.  "I suppose not," she allowed, then, more soberly, "You will let me know if you need more?  Especially if it is for arms for our defense.  I would like to share the burden." 

"And do you have coin?" he asked, sitting down beside her on the kist and putting his arm about her slim waist. 

"A little."  She drew his head down. 

Dírmaen gave himself to her kiss, which had lost none of its bewitching sweetness to familiarity.  How easy it would be, to scoop her up and carry her back to their bed . . . .  

Too soon, she pushed him gently away.  "I must be on my way," she sighed, trailing her fingers down his breast, "if I am to get any work done before we meet under the rowans." 

Capturing her hand, he pressed it to his heart.  "Take care, love, until then." 

Dírmaen sat there a little while after she picked up her packbasket and left, savouring his contentment.  The whole of the summer seemed blessed, as if it strove to make amends for the year's ill start.  Was he mazed in enchantment, or was this truth?  He had always taken pride in his grim resolution: happiness felt wondrous strange, like some dream of childhood grown rich and deep.  His fears—of fickleness, of tyranny, of Veylin's interference—had proved unfounded; their disagreements trifles, like this matter of whether she would appear more dignified with reins in her hands or leaving such work to others. 

When she charged that he wished to have her arms about him for days on end, he could not deny it.  Nor did he see that it weakened his argument.  But enough; the sun must be well up by now, and it would be shameful if Grimr arrived and was told he had not yet left his bedchamber.  Pulling on his shirt, he hunted out his boots and took up his swordbelt. 

"No!" Muirne protested as he stepped out into the hall.  "You have had your share!" 

Startled by any show of temper from Artan's bashful wife, Dírmaen stared in the direction she swung her spoon and saw Hanadan skip nimbly away, a hunk of bannock clutched in his grubby hand.  With a grin, the boy bit into his prize. 

"Hanadan."  Dírmaen girded on his sword. 

Gulping, the rascal turned to him, thrusting the bread down his shirt.  "Sir?" 

"Do not speak with your mouth full."  Here was another colt that needed taking into hand.  "You want a knife, do you not?" 

"Yes sir!" 

"Do you know the wayfaring tree?" 

Puzzled, the boy shook his head. 

"Ask Gaernath—he will show you.  But go first to Finean and ask to borrow the bill.  When I come home this evening, I will want two-score stems suitable for arrowshafts.  If I am pleased, I will entrust other tasks to you.  So you may earn a knife." 

"Where is Finean?" 

"You wish to be a Ranger.  Hunt him out!"  Taking the cup of ale Muirne offered, Dírmaen said, as the pelting footfalls faded, "That should keep him from mischief today.  You must learn to manage such scamps, mistress.  Did you have no brothers?" 

"No," she replied, once again shy as a roe.  "Did you know, sir, that Finean has already left for the peat bank?" 

"I thought he had.  The run will do the boy good.  Does he filch much?" 

"Oh, no!" 

Such a sweet lass, but he could not have borne a wife whose peace came from pretending ill did not happen.  Rian would tell him true, or Unagh, if pressed.  A growing boy would eat, but if he would be a Ranger, Hanadan must learn to ask rather than take. 

Laying cheese and cold mutton deep on his bannock, Dírmaen took it outside, walking across the ledge to look out on the day.  Though he stood in cool shadow, the sun's strength already beat on the lea below, parching the full-headed barley pale as the sere sand amid the dunes.  If rain would hold off but a day or two longer, they should have a fine harvest.  A corncrake cried rustily across the little river; Unagh sang at her work in the dairy, and Rian, embroidering Saelon's gown for their visit to the Havens, lifted her voice in lilting reply from the bench by the door. 

Poor Randir.  She did not miss him.  Dírmaen wondered where his friend was now.  The Emyn Uial?  Fornost? 

The bird's harsh creaking stopped.  Glancing that way, he saw the small figure of a pony and rider trotting briskly down the river track.  Grimr would be able to tell him when Randir had left Srathen Brethil and how the colts had behaved on the road.  Draining his cup, Dírmaen returned to the hall for another cup and more ale. 

"Welcome, Master Grimr!" he hailed the Dwarf, when the smith halted his mount in the yard, and went to take the beast's head.  "You have had a pleasant morning for your ride." 

"Well met, Dírmaen," Grimr acknowledged, dismounting.  "Aye—a fine morning, but I would not mind if a few clouds blew in before I turned for home.  I do not wish for rain," he hastened to add, as he rummaged in his saddlebag and brought out a roll of soft leather.  "Not so near harvest." 

"Thank you.  There is ale on the bench.  Fill your cup, while I stable this fellow." 

Grimr bowed.  "Greetings, lady," Dírmaen heard him address Rian. 

"Good morning to you, Master!  What news can you give us of Srathen Brethil?" 

"Drustan's family has joined him.  His wife was wrathful at the state of her house, but Halpan assured me it was much worse before.  When I left, she was in better temper." 

Rian laughed as Dírmaen led the sturdy little grey to the byre-cave.  "Brianag likes things just so.  Their children are well?" 

He did not hear the Dwarf's reply, but when he rejoined them, the smith was saying, "Your corn is full a month further along." 

"Oh, dear.  I hope they have a dry autumn.  How disheartening, to work so hard and all for naught!" 

"Did you often lose crops to wet?" Dírmaen asked. 

"Once," Rian sighed.  "When I was little.  We fell back on our cattle, but Gaernath says they have few beasts yet."  She looked up at him.  "We will help them, will we not?" 

"Your aunt will not let any of your folk starve, so long as there is anything to share," Dírmaen assured her, taking a seat beside their guest and refilling his own cup.  "And if there is not, she will take them seaweed and winkles, and stand over them until they eat it." 

Rian laughed again, a merry peal.  It was good to hear when but two years had passed since they were in such straits. 

"Seaweed?"  Grimr looked dubious. 

"Aye.  The Lady's laverbread is very wholesome," Dírmaen told him, "but I know no one who savors it save for Hanadan and herself." 

"What does it taste like?" 

"I will see if we have any," Rian offered, setting her stitching aside, "and bring something nicer to take the taste away after." 

"Srathen Brethil does not prosper?" Dírmaen asked, as Grimr passed him the roll of leather. 

"From what they say," the smith answered, "they have had a hard start.  Yet they are determined.  I think they will do well enough." 

As he tugged loose the knot that bound the wrapper, Dírmaen wondered how much the Dwarf had profited from Srathen Brethil's misfortune.  When he had sheltered there last autumn and again in Nínui, the houses had been stripped of what little metal they had ever had: pot-chains and spits, kettles and griddles, sickles and scythes.  If the owners had not carried such goods away with them when they fled, they had lost them. 

Yet, when he unrolled the leather and saw the shapely leaf-points of new-forged iron, gleaming with a light coat of grease, he had to allow Grimr's work was worth his price.  Taking one up, Dírmaen weighed it in his hand and sighted along its straightness.  "I would not mind them a little heavier," he said.  "The stags hereabout are large, and the outlaws sometimes wear boiled leather." 

"Shall I remake them?" 

"No.  These will serve."  One by one he inspected each.  "These will serve very well.  Six pence was the price we agreed, was it not?" 

"It was." 

Dírmaen drew the slim silver pennies from his pouch and passed them over.  "If we are both here next year, I may take a dozen broadheads." 

Grimr raised his cup.  "I will remind you of it.  Is there anything else you require at present?  Shoes for your horse?  A gift for your lady?  I do not believe I have made her a knife." 

"No—she already has an excellent knife of dwarven steel.  But what would you ask for a boy's knife?  Iron would do." 

"How large is the boy?" 

"It would be for Hanadan." 

The Dwarf considered, wiping stray ale from his whiskers.  "Tuppence complete.  A pence and a half for the unhafted blade.  When would you like it?" 

"Oh, he must earn it first, and now I know how much he must do.  It will be some months." 

"Very good."  For a moment, Dírmaen thought the smith would smile, but just then Rian returned, offering a piece of rough, green-black laverbread.  "Here you are, Master Grimr!" she said gaily.  "It is tough to chew, but I know you Dwarves do not mind that." 

Grimr was game; Dírmaen allowed him that.  He paused after he had chewed enough to get the flavor, but finished the slice, face set in stony dwarven reserve.  "May your harvests always be bountiful, lady," he said gravely, once he had drained his cup. 

Looking as though she now regretted suggesting the trial to him, Rian hastened to offer him their choicest dainty in recompense, thin, sweet cakes made from one of the grains Saelon had been trying, with lashings of butter and honey.  "Oatcakes!" the Dwarf exclaimed, reaching gladly for the nearest.  "I did not know you made them." 

"They are new to us," Rian admitted, watching a little anxiously as he chomped on the cake.  "This is the first year we have had enough of the grain to eat.  You like them?" 

"Very much," he assured her, reaching for a second, and then a third, before brushing the crumbs from his beard and setting down his cup.  "Thank you for the refreshment, lady, but if you—" he looked to Dírmaen as well "—have no further business with me, I will take my leave before the day grows hotter." 

"I must be off as well," Dírmaen said.  "Let me get my bow, and I will see you as far as Maelchon's." 

He asked after Randir as they went along the river path, receiving a good report of his friend and the colts before he parted from the Dwarf at the kennels, which they had moved nearer Maelchon's for the security the dogs might provide.  Teig seemed happier here: a simple soul, he was dreadfully abashed in Saelon's presence and tongue-tied even in the company of his fellows.  Though he was welcome in the men's chamber in the cliff-hall and Maelchon had repeatedly offered him a place by his hearth, most nights he slept here, snugly blanketed by hounds.  Now he sat in the sun before the sod hut and its high-paled yard, shirtless and weaving a light hurdle of withies, while a sprawl of half-grown pups avidly gnawed sheep's knuckles all about him.  "Good day, Teig," Dírmaen greeted him, stooping to fondle the ears of a pup that abandoned its bone to prance hopefully about his boots.  "I have come for Bronwe and Naeth." 

The kennelman smiled and bobbed his head. 

"Do you or the dogs want for anything?" Dírmaen asked, as he walked to the gate of the yard.  Naeth was already on the other side, snuffing at the gap and whining eagerly. 

"Na."  Teig picked up another willow wand. 

From the three hounds Aniel had brought out of Srathen Brethil, they now had a very fair pack—or would once the young dogs were properly trained.  Last year's litter was still good for naught but hares, and Garo, one of Aniel's dogs, was growing elderly, but three couple was ample for their needs.  It was not easy to separate out the pair Teig had gifted him at Midsummer as they all pressed close, begging for a run. 

When he had shut the gate firmly in Laeg's long, imploring face, Dírmaen called Bronwe and Naeth from the pups' bones and set off up-river at an easy lope, keen to make up for his late start. 

None of the children were on watch by the track to Maelchon's; they would be gathered about Grimr for his news of their old neighbors.  Maon waved as he passed the upper ford.  Up, then, across the moor, sumptuous in its cloak of blooming heather, the hounds flushing grouse as they scouted the path ahead.  When they had gone two leagues, they stopped to quench their thirst where the river ran swiftly, even in this dry season, through a jumble of boulders. 

Now he slowed his pace, striding briskly beside the water.  The sun, its heat sullen as its reign shortened, was climbing high, and the nearest shade was the tall rowan half a league ahead.  The wispy clouds above gave no relief, but neither did they threaten rain: a good harvest was worth some sweat.  As the sentinel tree came into sight, Dírmaen recalled the night he had spent there this time last year with a smile of wry amusement.  How much had changed since then!  Sick with desire for Saelon, he had envied the stallion that broke his uneasy sleep, covering Gwinnor's witchy grey mare.  Had she foaled yet?  If he met with the Elf when they visited the Havens, he must ask, and see the foal if he could, to get some idea of its quality.  Not only was he curious to see a cross between Môrfast and an elven steed, but Gwinnor had promised to pay Saelon some part of its value if he chose to sell. 

Dírmaen turned over the preparations for their journey south as he scanned the ground before him, seeking tracks in places where a mark might have been left: bare patches on the ridges through the white-flecked bogs, the glistening shallows and narrows where the river and the burns that fed it could be crossed.  Gaernath—those were Coll's hoofprints there, from the lad's patrol three days ago—continued to mature.  He had served commendably as errand-rider between Saelon and Halpan, and should be capable of dealing with any ordinary trouble.  Disappointed though he was not to be going to the Havens, whose Elves he found so enchanting, the lad was proud to be trusted with guarding Habad and Rian . . . and if ill did befall, there were the Dwarves nearby, and Halpan and Partalan but a day away. 

At the fork where the river turned north, Dírmaen found the slot of a grand stag and several hinds, plus the prints of a wildcat, no more.  Pleased, he turned south, setting his course along the front of the high hills.  This way was seldom trodden: there were no passes between these peaks, or certain ways across the boggy moor below.  If Saelon desired venison for the harvest feast, he would ride here with Gaernath and the pack, and take one of the full-fleshed harts fencing for lordship.  He could hear them bellowing now, up in the corries.  The hounds cocked their ears and snuffed the warm breeze, continually looking to him for permission to seek, but he called them to heel and pushed on.  He was after his own hind today, and knew where she was lodged. 

Naeth started a hare on the high levels shortly after midday, and Dírmaen gave him and Bronwe leave to chase with a cry.  Standing there, eyes shaded, Dírmaen's heart was with the handsome beasts, coursing with fierce, single-minded joy over the tussocky grass.  Bronwe ran wide, but Naeth held close to his quarry, stretching every bound to the utmost, seeking to justify his name. 

Ears down, the hare broke left and doubled back—almost into Bronwe's jaws.  A leap; the flash of fangs; the dreadful cry of the stricken hare, soon cut short. 

"A canny bitch," said an admiring voice at his shoulder. 

Dírmaen jumped, turning as tight a curve as the hapless hare, hand flying to his hilt. 

"Peace!" Coruwi cried, grinning, open hands raised.  "Were you too engrossed in the chase to hear me approach?" 

"As well you knew," Dírmaen huffed, feeling foolish.  Where had the Elf sprung from, in this open land?  "How do you do, Coruwi?" 

"Very well.  It has been a fat summer.  And yourself?" 

"I cannot complain."  He had not seen the Elf since before Midsummer.  Did Coruwi know he was wedded, though irregularly, to Saelon?  She had met with the marchwarden in Cerveth; surely she had told him they were handfast, even if she kept a decent silence about her irregular interpretation of that bond.  Yet the penetration of the Elf's smiling gaze brought something like the warmth of guilt to Dírmaen's face.  He and Saelon had been shameless as beasts, sometimes, when they met far from Habad, enjoying the freedom to be had in these empty lands.  It did not do, however, to forget the light foot and long sight of the Elves, whose country this was.  The land might not be as empty as it appeared.  "Have you or your men seen anything amiss in the mountains?" Dírmaen asked, direct to their duty, resolving to be more discreet in future.  "We hear the sodden spring delayed planting in Eriador, and Halpan and the Dwarves fear the harvest will be poor." 

"Let us hope not," Coruwi replied.  "No, all is peaceable, save the stags.  You may go to Mithlond easy in your mind.  Who do you leave behind on guard, now that Randir has left?  Gaernath?" 

"That was our plan."  Bronwe padded up and laid the hare at his feet, licking blood from her muzzle and gazing up at him with a kind of wistful hopefulness, echoed by the trailing Naeth.  Bending to take up their quarry, Dírmaen weighed it in his hand: a leveret, hardly more than a few morsels.  As he squatted to make the cuts that would allow him to peel its pelt, he looked up at Coruwi.  "Will you also travel to Mithlond for Yáviérë?" 

"Yes, but I will leave enough foresters to keep watch." 

Dírmaen looked up.  "Will you keep us company?"  He was uncertain himself whether it was an invitation or a mere question.  Courtesy demanded the former; yet how could they refuse the marchwarden if he chose to escort them?  If Coruwi did, the intimacy he and Saelon had been anticipating would be impossible. 

Coruwi laughed.  "Thank you, but no!  We will travel more swiftly than you, with your plodding packbeasts.  I do not think you will see us until you near the Lhûn." 

Now he wondered if the Elf was being magnanimous.  Standing, he broke the bare carcass and threw each piece to a hound.  "We will look for you," he promised, putting the pelt in his scrip.  Misliking the feeling that he had been found out amidst some mischief, he asked, "May we also look for you and your foresters at our harvest feast a few days hence?" 

"That is kind!  The Lady's ale is well worth drinking," Coruwi declared.  "Yet the Dwarves will be there, will they not?" 

"Most assuredly." 

"I will come," Coruwi assured him, a shade less merry.  "But I doubt I will have many companions.  If you are seeking venison," he offered, changing the topic, "there is a noble hart between Amon Eithel and Tuntelu who is badly lame.  He will not give much sport, as he is, but he would make a capital dish for your feast." 

Dírmaen inclined his head in thanks.  "If your men would rather, we would be glad if they would join us, though the sport be poor.  We can provide refreshment as well as hounds.  Shall we meet here two hours after sunrise, the day after tomorrow?" 

"Certainly!  We will look for you!" 

"Until then," Dírmaen said in farewell, and set off again, whistling the hounds to heel.  Then, and not before.  May carrying word to his men take him far from the burn of two rowans! 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**Wayfaring tree** ( _Viburnum lantana_ ): this shrub and the closely related Guelder rose were the prefered source of arrowshafts through much of Europe from the Neolithic.

**Bill** : a tool with a hooked edge, mounted on a pole and used for pruning.

**Laverbread** : long-boiled and pounded slake ( _Porphyra_ spp.), a purple-red to olive-green seaweed, which is also used to make _nori_ for sushi wrappers.

**Boiled leather** : or _cuirbouilli_ in French.  Boiling leather hardens it, and this was used as the cheapest form of armor.

**Broadheads** : what most people think of as "arrowhead-shaped"—a point with a relatively wide, barbed base.  Since barbs make it difficult to remove the point and increase damage and blood loss if it moves in the target's flesh (say, as the man or beast tries to flee), this shape was favored in the later medieval period.  Leaf-shaped (lenticular) points were more common earlier, but we can see preferences shift back and forth between these two options even when projectile points were knapped from stone.

**Leveret** : a young hare, usually in its first year.


	9. Bridge over Troubled Water

_ Our passions are most like to floods and stream,  
_ _ The shallow murmur, but the deep are dumb. _

—Sir Walter Ralegh, _Sir Walter Ralegh to the Queen_

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

"Nay," Nordri objected, holding his pony back to fall in between her and Sút, "it was a pleasant little party, though I grant we were cramped by the rain.  If I had known we would be with them so often, perhaps I would have argued for delving them a larger hall!" 

Beneath the leaden and louring sky, Auð was grateful for the mason's enduring good temper.  Ever since her return from the feast at White Cliffs, weeks ago, Sút had been quarrelsome, marching on the road of discontent until it was as rutted as this steep, mud-slick path down to the bridge.  Rough Beck, the men called this stream, halfway between Gunduzahar and Sulûnduban, and even from here she could see why.  There had not been a day without rain since just before the Men's celebration—she was beginning to fear that the double covers of waxed canvas on the chests would not protect the fine garments she had laboured over—and water foamed white about the rocks midstream and high on the bridge's piers. 

Stout piers, Auð took pains to observe.  Surely they had withstood many such floods. 

"I was not speaking of the crush, though that was unpleasant," Sút answered, unmollified by Nordri's smile.  "It was commonplace, hardly an occasion at all.  That any can recall it with approval is very strange.  It certainly fell far below their Spring Day feast, let alone the one we gave them in return." 

"Why should you expect so much," Nordri wondered, "from Men so few and so poor?  Their Spring feast was unusually fine, to thank us for coming to their aid when they were beset by brigands—and generous that was, too, when none of us blooded an axe—while ours repaid them for years of steady hospitality.  Why, every time we go to the White Cliff cuttings, we are asked to step over and take a cup when our work is done.  So many cups add up to quite a sum." 

Auð glanced towards Veylin, who sat, determinedly silent, on his placid sorrel a few paces to her right, and their eyes met.  It was not often that they were of one mind, but a deep vein of blood sympathy ran between them now.  He had never much liked Sút; rarely had Auð been so embarrassed by her friend.  Yet there was no mending such matters on the road.  They would have to bear it as best they could until they reached the mansion, where they could closet themselves and take candid counsel together. 

What had soured Sút?  Had she been ill-treated at the Men's harvest feast, or did she resent Auð's unwillingness to accompany her there?  Sút had pressed her hard, but honestly, there had been too much to do in preparation for the Great Council, and Rian had traded all she was willing to part with in Úrimë.  By spring the lass would have woven more; perhaps then it would be worth another meeting.  Why had Sút thought going worth the journey?  As Nordri said, the Men were poor—too poor for silver, certainly—and now that Grimr went to White Cliffs so often, there was a regular supply of fresh dainties on their own table.  Such concerns as Auð had ever had about Veylin's judgment regarding the Lady and her folk were satisfied.  He and the other men could deal with the Men.  That was their duty. 

Ingi urged his reluctant mount back up the track towards them.  "Nordri," he asked gravely, "will you come and survey the bridge before we cross?  The beck is in full spate, and Rekk wonders if it would be better to cross at the ford." 

"There is a ford?"  Sút eyed the bridge dubiously.  "How far?" 

"Certainly," Nordri answered, and he and Ingi trotted down the hill together. 

"How far to the ford?" Sút repeated, nettled. 

Veylin shifted in his saddle, knuckling the painful place above his knee.  "Over two leagues upstream.  It would add full a day, and there is no house to shelter in further up the dale." 

Spits of rain began to fall, and Auð retreated deeper into her hood.  It was bad enough to be exposed all day, but the night as well, and in such foul weather?  She fixed her mind firmly on the comfort of her sitting room in Sulûnduban and schooled herself to resignation.  If the bridge was not safe, they must go the long way. 

As their long string of ponies clopped and slithered nearer the beck, Auð did all she could to harden herself.  Full spate?  Overfull, more like.  She remembered a narrow bed, easily spanned by the three-slab bridge, full of tumbled boulders whose rounded shoulders had always been dry.  Now the greenery along the verge was drowned, and water purled over the boulders, sunk deep, breaking into white spray wherever one stood clear. 

Though the fierce torrent flung itself ceaselessly at the piled piers of the bridge, Nordri was down on one knee on the center span, a hand spread flat on the stone slab, hooded head bowed in concentration. 

Or prayer.  Thyrnir called to Balnar and Neðan, telling them to halt the packtrain.  What remained of the terrace was already overcrowded, and they might all need to toil back up the hill again. 

Rising, Nordri came back to them.  "It is sound," he said with assurance.  "Auð and Sút . . . would you rather go first, or wait?" 

Waiting would make it no safer.  "Should we ride, or lead our beasts?" Auð asked.  She had always ridden before, but today the slabs looked narrower. 

"Whichever you prefer.  Would you like me to lead your pony for you?" the mason asked, as she dismounted. 

"Thank you.  I would." 

Rekk swung down and went before her, leaving his mount to Ingi; Nordri came behind with hers.  She could feel the force of the water below through her hobnailed boots: the slight, unnerving quiver of the stone as it resisted the flood.  Fixing her eyes on the slab ahead, Auð stepped briskly, breathing freely only when she stood once more on the solid ground of the further shore. 

"Sút?" Rekk called, turning back, and his brow furrowed.  "Where is Sút?" 

On the other side, the men shuffled, mute . . . then Veylin jerked his chin towards a clump of gorse a decent distance upstream.  "Go on," he ordered, curt, as the rain fell more steadily.  "I will see her across.  Get the packbeasts over, if you do not wish to be in this muck after dark!" 

Auð mounted again, before her saddle grew soaked, glad of the beast's rising warmth against the raw air.  Even though she was safe across, her heart was often in her mouth as they brought the cross-grained pack ponies over, especially when the one carrying Veylin's new suit balked at the end of the first span.  Neðan hauled on its lead rope, to no avail, until Thyrnir—reckless boy!—squeezed past the beast along the very rim of the slab and hooded it with an empty sack. 

"What is he doing?" she demanded.  It would never move now! 

Ingi chuckled.  "It is a trick Thyrð taught us, that he learned from Dírmaen on the road to the Grey Havens.  See?  When it cannot see what it fears, it suffers itself to be led." 

So it did, though very slowly, and two other beasts required the same measures.  Across the way, Sút was back on her pony, beside Veylin on his.  Auð grimaced, for it looked as if they were quarreling.  Sút waved Balnar ahead, the gesture speaking louder than _iglishmêk_ , when he offered to let her cross before Bersi's copper. 

Bringing Sút to Gunduzahar had not been a success.  Not that she had not been glad of her company; but her friend's roguish daring had become mere recklessness once she was beyond the mansion's bounds, disturbing the men and repelling Hlin.  There was no silver, and no market for her craft.  Would Sút be offended if Auð suggested she remain at Sulûnduban when the company returned to Gunduzahar?  Or would she welcome an opportunity to sell out her share?  Blowing a fat drop of rain off the edge of her hood, Auð sighed.  There would be ample time to sound her out.  After the Great Council was the New Year, and then Yule.  They would not travel back to the delf for a full quarter, or more.  Much might happen between now and then. 

The rain began to come down in earnest.  Oh, let them get moving!  Though perhaps she should be content that they would be under a roof in a few hours, rather than trudging through the trackless heather towards a wet and windswept camp.  How awfully uncomfortable traveling was! 

The last of the pack ponies, carrying the coal for their fires, was coming across, hesitant and snorting.  Veylin spoke to Sút, who shook her heard and put her pony at the bridge as if she meant to ride across.  Though Oski had started the slow-footed pack train on the climb to the ridge above, Thyrnir, lingering by her side, frowned, and Rekk chuffed, muttering something like "mad."  Veylin hung on his saddle horns, torn between dismounting and following Sút's lead, his game leg increasing his awkwardness. 

As her mount reached the central span, Sút twisted in the saddle, calling back to Veylin.  What she said could not be heard over the rushing water—but her pony, stepping wide to balance, slipped on the wet, muddy stone, scrabbled to recover, and put a hoof over the edge. 

With dreadful inevitability, the slab tilted . . . and all slid into the flood below: pony, Sút, and stone together, the pony's screech drowning their horrified cries. 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Later, Veylin thought it was Auð's cry that set him into motion rather than the falling pony's shriek.  If Sút cried out, he could not recall it.  Even as the swollen stream swallowed them, the slab sending up a great splash, he heaved himself back into the saddle.  Wrenching his sorrel's head to the right, he kicked him into motion. 

The current was very swift.  If Sút was not pinned by stone or entangled with her mount, she would come up well downstream. 

More than a chain ahead, the black pony's head lifted from the water, drawing a great breath through wide red nostrils.  A flash of white-rimmed eye; a scream; and the current drew the beast down again into a boil of froth, battering and rolling it over the rocks, blunt and cruel as troll's teeth. 

There!  Her hood had been swept off, and there was no mistaking her braids, with the flash of silver near the ends.  Gasping, Sút clung to a fang of stone that jutted from the water.  A stay, and a welcome one, but how long could she hold herself there against the force of the water?  Halting his pony, Veylin surveyed the stream, striving to remember the shape and character of the bed masked by the flood.  On the far bank, he saw Nyr snatching a coil of rope from a pack and running towards the shore, but there was a race full of jagged stone on that side. 

Standing in the stirrups, Veylin bellowed, as if across the clamour of battle, "Sút!  Sút!"  When she finally turned her head his way, he waved her towards him.  "This way!" 

The water was less rough here, running swiftly down the main channel.  But was she uninjured, and strong enough to cross it?  Could she swim?  Did lasses race across the pools of the baths, as lads did? 

If ever a lass did, it would have been Sút.  Face grim, she loosed one hand long enough to snatch free the pin holding the cloak that half-strangled her—a fine ring-pin of her own making, almost a span long—breathed deep, and struck out towards him. 

The torrent took her as if she were a twig, sweeping her along faster than the trusty sorrel beneath him could make its way across the treacherous, half-flooded ground.  She was carried nearly two chains before she had crossed half the distance between them, finding refuge on another boulder, this one low and flat enough that she could haul herself part out of the water, sodden and gasping. 

On the further shore, the others followed, unable to help but unwilling to abandon them. 

If only he had the rope in Nyr's hand!  Sút was hardly more than five paces from the bank: he could cast a stone-weighted line so far with ease, and draw her in as though she were a fish.  For even if she was not tiring, she was running out of distance to beat her way to the shallows.  Less than a chain downstream, the beck narrowed to a rock-cut channel.  Near the end, he might reach across it with his blackthorn stick—but if she missed her grip, the water plunged several paces down into a pool, carved deep and round by the grinding of boulders in floods such as this. 

Whatever fell into that seething cauldron would be lost beyond recovery. 

Leaving her to store breath and strength, Veylin rode down to survey the channel and pool.  Rekk was doing the same on the other side, and the waterwright's face was very grave.  The flood had spread wide on their shore, cutting them off from the narrows, or they might have tossed the rope across, or even helped catch and hold Sút if she was swept into the chute.  Nyr, rope still in hand, gamely stepped into the pool, but he was hardly knee-deep before either the current or poor footing staggered him, and Rekk called him sharply back.  The two argued for a time, then both looked upstream, towards what was left of the bridge. 

Veylin looked as well, but could see little, and when Rekk waved him upstream, he did not go in much hope.  Trotting along the better ground, he became aware of the rain again: a dull, thrumming downpour, as if the heavens hated them.  Sitting under its lash, waiting for the others, Veylin glumly considered the possibility.  As he had feared, not only the central span had gone, but bits of the piers as well, leaving the end-slabs precariously balanced. 

Even so, it was the narrowest place on the swollen beck, and when Nyr edged cautiously onto his end, he was able to heave one end of the rope across tied to a stone.  Dismounting and venturing carefully into the shallows where it splashed—he could get no wetter—Veylin drew the rest across. 

"Can you get her to the Riven House?" Rekk boomed across the rushing flood.  "Thyrnir and Oski are preparing to ride to the ford." 

"We will see," he shouted back, wondering how badly Sút was battered.  The Riven House—dear Father, that was nearly two leagues down the dale, further from the ford, and Sút would surely need to ride.  Which meant he must walk. 

If he had marched to the fiend's corrie, he could do this.  They must have shelter, for the wet chill was already sapping his strength, and Sút would have little left after battling the cold water.  Even the Riven House would be better than nothing. 

Coiling the rope, he climbed onto his pony and went back to Sút.  As he feared, she was already so weakened that it took her a long time to untie the stone that brought the rope and make it fast about her, clumsy fingers leaving fleeting red stains on the tow, blood washed away by the beck and the rain. 

"Ready?" Veylin called, when the pause before she committed herself to the water stretched on and on.  He had already wrapped his end of the rope fast about a stout boulder, so she would not drag him if he stumbled.  His grip he trusted, but not his lame leg. 

Though her nod was unconvincing, Sút slipped from the desperate haven of her boulder into the relentless current. 

Veylin did stumble, but caught himself, leaning back hard against the pull.  The drag was greater than he expected, for rather than trying to swim, Sút hung, a dead weight, at the end of the rope, striving merely to keep her head above the surface of the roiling water.  Alarmed, Veylin set his boots with particular care and heaved mightily, straining to bring her to shore as quickly as he might.  Hand over slow hand he hauled her in, forearms trembling by the time he pulled her out of the main thrust of the current. 

When he had dragged her into the shallows, he briefly feared he might have to lift her from the water, but she rose shakily to hands and knees, and crawled like a beast, retching and coughing, to the land. 

A faint cheer came across the flood, dimmed by the roar of the water and uncertain of triumph. 

Casting his sodden cloak about her for what warmth it might provide, Veylin stooped to help her rise.  "Are you sorely wounded?  Anything broken?"  Her hands were battered, with torn nails, but blood would not show on the already drenched black of her garments. 

She shook her bedraggled head, clutching the woolen cloak close about her.  "Cold," she rasped. 

"I am sorry, but there is no place here to shelter a fire from the rain.  Can you sit a pony?  We will have to go a little way." 

"Where are the others?" Sút wondered, leaning heavily on him as she climbed painfully to her feet. 

Veylin led her to his sorrel.  "Across the water.  See?  There is Auð, waving.  Some of the lads are already on their way to the nearest ford.  They will bring you another mount, and then we will rejoin the company." 

Sút raised her arm to return the salute and winced; she groaned aloud as he helped her mount, while Veylin clenched his teeth on his own pain.  He had not asked so much of his damaged leg since the slaying of the fiends, and now he must ask for more.  "Wait here," he told Sút, who had folded down onto the pony's neck, probably for its warmth.  "I must speak to the others, and then we will go." 

"Be quick." 

That sounded more like.  Still, as Veylin stumped back to the wrecked bridge to confer with Rekk, he caught himself wishing Saelon were here, to tell him whether Sút's slowness could be blamed on the numbing cold of the water or if she had cracked her head on a boulder.  Eyeing the tumultuous stream, he decided it would be a miracle if Sút's crown had not taken a dunt or three.  Fortunately, her head was extraordinarily hard.  He had seen men suffer worse at the hands of Orcs and fight again the next day.  Besides, how could Saelon examine Sút without discovering she was a woman? 

Not that he cared greatly whether Sút was revealed, given her own criminal lack of caution.  But if Saelon, shrewd as she was, learned that their women walked abroad as men, how long would it be before she guessed that Auð was not his kins _man_? 

Auð stood by Rekk as he called across, "How is she?" 

"Chilled and battered, but otherwise she seems sound.  I will take her to the Riven House." 

"Then you will need this."  Rekk threw over a pair of stout saddlebags, one at a time.  "Food and coal.  Use them sparingly!  The lads may not reach you until late tomorrow." 

A miserable night suddenly looked a little less cheerless.  "Many thanks!  Now get Auð and yourselves under a roof!  You can do no more for us." 

"You can walk so far?" Auð shouted. 

Beard bristling, he roared back, "I have and I can.  But if my temper is short when we meet, do not complain of it!" 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**_Iglishmêk_** : dwarven gesture-language.

**Chain** : a distance of about 22 yards or 20 meters.


	10. House Divided

_ Open rebuke is better than secret love. _

— _Proverbs_ 27:5

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Throbbing in his shoulder and his leg; the scent of stone and open air; dim, indirect sunlight.  For a moment, waking, Veylin thought he was in Saelon's little cave, wounded by the fiend . . . yet the soughing in his ear was someone's breath, not the mutter of the sea, and a warm weight lay across his breast.

Guardedly he peered from slitted eyes.  The roof above him was the dressed stone of a dwarf-house, though a long rift let in morning light and breeze, and the weight on his breast was Sút, her head pillowed on his shoulder and one arm clasped about him.

The Riven House, where he had brought the half-drowned Sút with toil and pain, through pitiless rain.  They lay where they had huddled for warmth in sodden clothes beside a meager coal fire, now choked by clinker and ash, with only the pony's saddle blanket between them and the unyielding hearthstone.  Their only other blanket, his cloak, had drifted during the night, tangling about their legs.  Yet though his clothing was still unpleasantly damp and his feet cold, it was not the mortal chill of yestereve, which had sapped his strength like a gushing wound.  They had endured: it was day; and with the blessing, aid would be here before nightfall with dry clothes and a comfortable supply of coal and food.

If Thyrnir and Oski had pushed on through the night, they might be here considerably earlier—a heartening thought, until Veylin realized it must be near midday for so much light to come through the cleft in the roof.  A tolerably sunny midday too, which would speed the lads on their way.  "Sút," he murmured, hesitantly.  Necessity could excuse much, but the youngsters must not find him lying in a woman's arms.  Besides, her not inconsiderable weight, pinning the shoulder wrung by hauling her from the flood, began to oppress him.

Her soft snoring quieted as she stirred in her sleep, but she did not wake.  She must be deep down, as near as a common Dwarf came to the restorative slumber of the Reborn.

"Sút."  He supposed he must not blame her, for this at least, but his embarrassment at her embrace grew.  He did not even like the woman, and their beards were mingled, russet curls amid the black.

She did not open her eyes but snuggled closer, a smile curving her lips.

Something stirred in his vitals, and he prayed it was apprehension.  This was beyond awkwardness.  Reaching for the hand that clasped his waist, Veylin considered riding out to meet Thyrnir, leaving Sút to wake to solitude and, may be, somber contemplation of her unwisdom.  No.  She was sorely battered and without any other protector; worse, she could not be trusted to sit still.  If they returned to find her missing, how would he explain himself, especially to Auð?

Prying her boulder-barked fingers from their hold was what roused her, and she groaned, clenching the hand into a fist.  Blinking in blank bemusement to find herself nose to nose with him, Sút sat up, slowly, her bruised face hardening as she stifled her pain.  "Where . . . ?"

"We call this the Riven House.  Thyrnir and Oski will meet us here, with a mount for you, as soon as they can, and if you are fit to ride, we will rejoin the company."

"The Riven House?"  She stared up at the lichen-stained rift in the roof, still dripping water from yesterday's rain.  "Why . . . ?  Oh."  Her face changed as memory woke, behindhand.  "My pony is dead?  Then how did I get to this place?"

"You rode mine.  Now you must pardon me, for I should step outside to make sure he is still with us.  I will return shortly."

Yet when he tried to stand, pain went through his game leg like a crossbow bolt and he froze, hissing.

Sút reached out, steadying him.  "What have you done?"

"What have _I_ done?" Veylin growled, smacking at the hand she laid on his knee.  "Nothing I have not done before.  Hand me my stick."

Though she had shame enough to put some color in her cheeks, where they were not already darkly bruised, she did not leave go.  "Do not be a fool from pride—as I have!  No wonder your leg does not mend, when you tax it so.  Sit down.  Why did you not ride as well?"

He did not sit, but nor could he creditably rise, not without his stick.  "It would have overburdened the beast."

Sút chuffed.  "That is what ponies are for, burdens.  You would rather cripple yourself than a beast?"

"My leg is not so bad as that," he dismissed.  "The damp and cold have made it rusty.  It will be well enough once it is rested."

"Then rest!" she insisted, pressing him down.

Veylin resisted, mouth set.  "Give me my stick."

Sút did not move, the black of her eyes more like obsidian than jet, hardly a handspan from his own.  "A woman of Men may succour you, but I may not?"

A setting sometimes seemed nonsensical when its heart-stone was lacking.  Now, with her hands tenacious upon him, a possibility occurred to Veylin that threw light from facet to oddly-angled facet, casting Sút's queer behavior suddenly, awfully into meaning.

Jealousy.

At one time, Veylin had been intimately familiar with the signs of that vice, for when he returned home after the War with the Orcs, the bidding for his hand had been uncommonly warm.  Just of an age to wed, a chieftain's only son and rising gemsmith, his reputation burnished by valour in battle, he had known he would be zealously wooed, and for the first year or two he had relished the ardent attentions of so many talented women.

Yet women strove for spouses as men did for mines, and the pleasure palled as their rivalries sharpened.  He had been expected to end them by making his choice: but the measured deliberation of dwarven courtship had shown him that his suitors were more enamoured of his prospects than his person or character.  He would not have minded a pragmatical spouse, not so long as she kindled some particular warmth in his own heart; but no one struck that spark.  Perhaps it was the fault of his shrewd eye, quick to detect flaws, even deep in a stone; perhaps his expectations were too nice, with Auð and Thekk's love as his example.  Whatever the reason, none suited, and Safna's resolve, recognizing no refusal, became such a trial that he had left Sulûnduban with his father's blessing, traveling widely in search of knowledge, skill, and hopefully a woman he could love.

Craft of mind and hand he had found in abundance, but not a wife, and as the decades passed, marriageable women ceased to invite his interest.  After the War, there were already too many youths who lacked a father's support as they came of age.  Who would deliberately handicap their children by taking a husband who could not live to see them wed?

Therefore this was doubly astounding.  Sút had never been one of his beaus.  As his elder sister's bosom friend, she would have had formidable advantages—but the only one she took was to tease and provoke him, a liberty he resented even as a child.

The clasp of her hand on his thigh—just above the knee, at the seat of the pain—was far beyond such liberties, however.  "Being more dead than alive when she found me, I had no say in the matter.  Leave go, Sút, and I will sit."

He had been silent too long.  Now her mouth was as hard as her eyes, and she did not let go.  "Do not tell me you have been blind all these years, rather than unfeeling."

"What are you speaking of?"  This ground was too hazardous for conjecture.

"You are like those opals that enchant you," Sút replied with bitter scorn.  "All the show of fire, but no heat.  Why I should still care for you, I do not know."

"Care for me?"  Any mortification he felt on account of his ignorance died.  "If you did, how was I to know?  You are always finding fault and quarreling with me!"

"You hate flattery and love argument, or you would not enjoy councils so much.  Why have you always sought my company, if you dislike me?"

Even if one enjoyed debate, there was no winning against such arguments as these.  Since she was so close to Auð, he must often see her, if he was to spend time with his sister.

His sister.  By the Deeps, did Sút's friendship with Auð come first, or was it only a means to keep near him?  "Did you come all the way to Gunduzahar merely to see whether I was too amiable with the Lady Saelon?"

"Lady," Sút sniffed.  "What did you give her that jewel for?  The silver was nicely done, by the by—I do not always find fault with you."

"Not as a love-token, or she would not be betrothed to Dírmaen."

The look Sút gave him was curious, perhaps disdainful.  "Do you truly believe they are betrothed?"

If she detected his consternation, Veylin hoped she mistook its root.  What did she know of Saelon's vows to Dírmaen, and how had she come by the knowledge?  "What do you mean?  They are handfast," he declared stoutly.

"Did none of the Men tell you that there are two kinds of handfasting, and only one is a betrothal?"  Sút clearly relished the opportunity to demean Saelon in his eyes.  "That is not the kind that joins your Lady and her paramour."

"Who told you so?" he demanded.

"Murdag."

"Murdag," Veylin scoffed, with some relief.  He did not think Sút could have found opportunity to unearth such scandal in the crowded confines of the hall at White Cliffs.  Their own feast was more likely, where there had been drink and darkness aplenty to encourage confidences—yet he had heard no rumor of Saelon's irregular union among the rest of the company.  Sút had held the secret close.  "A discontented wench of so little sense she wedded Leod when she might have had Gaernath.  Why should you trust her understanding?"

"How much wit does it take to see they share a bedchamber?"

"Murdag has dwelt in Maelchon's household since the spring.  How drunk did you get the lass?"

"You are defending her," Sút accused, scowling.  "You always defend her, no matter how outrageous her conduct."

"Outrageous?"  Veylin put his eyebrows up.  "What do you find objectionable, save for this rumored liaison?"

"Your countenance of her freedom!  She comes and goes as she pleases, with no restraint, often unaccompanied, I am told.  And you admire her boldness!  Yet if I want to go abroad, even to your trusted neighbors with a strong escort, I am a rash creature, indecent."

Jealous, yes; and of more than his attention.  "She is not Khuzd."

"It is no more natural for the women of Men to rove than for our kind," Sút countered sharply.

"Men value their women less than we do."

"They are all—even your Lady—careful enough of Rian."

"Like us, the Dúnedain are few.  Of course they guard of their women."

"Your Lady is not Dúnedain?"

"Not always, in their eyes.  She is," Veylin said with bitter distaste, "stunted."

Sút looked on him with contempt.  "And that is why you treat her as kin?"

She did not understand.  She did not desire to understand, so explanation would be useless.  "How can you want me," Veylin wondered, aggrieved, "when you think so meanly of me?"

"There is nothing wrong with you that a Khuzd could not fix," Sút assured him, her hand drifting on his thigh.  "You have been too long among aliens.  Come," she murmured, leaning closer.  "Let me repay you for your pains on my behalf.  Perhaps we will mend each other."

When he said she wanted him, he had not imagined her desire was so alive, or he would never have invoked it.  "It is too late for that," he objected rather wildly, alarmed by the black heat of her eyes.  They were alone in this ill-fated place, and she was a daring woman, with scant respect for propriety.  "I wish you had spoken long ago—"

She did not give him a chance to finish.  "I would have spoken, if you had not fled the mansion without warning to escape Safna."

"I did not flee."

Sút snorted softly.  "Very well.  You carried messages to the Iron Hills for your father, and did not return until Safna was safely wed, twenty-three years later.  Do not look so aghast," she chided, as he continued to stare.  "I am not proposing we wed.  That would be a scandal, at our age.  Auð would be grieved."

The thought of his sister's reaction to any of this cleared Veylin's head like the sight of naked steel.  Reaching down, he captured Sút's licentious hand and removed it from his leg.  "Stop this, Sút, before I regret pulling you from the water.  You have deluded yourself.  I do not desire you.  I never have.  If you were not my sister's friend, I would have nothing to do with you.  Have I made myself plain?" he asked, fixing her with his sternest glare.

"More than amply."  Now the heat in her eyes was that of resentment, the perilous offense of a woman spurned.  He had made an enemy today, unless long desire had bent her mind irrevocably towards him.

Veylin would rather she hated him.  Hate was straightforward, and if she slandered him, her reputation was the more fragile.  Thwarted lust, however, led down queer, sometimes abhorrent paths.  She was already some way down that road: with one breath, she disparaged Saelon for taking a lover out of wedlock, then with another, she suggested they do the same.

He was not dead to carnal desire, but neither did he burn.  One would have to be desperate indeed to give oneself to so unsteady a woman.  "Good.  Now, if you truly wish to repay me for fishing you from the flood, hand me my stick."

She did, holding it by the very end.

"Thank you." 

The stab of pain as he thrust himself to his feet was almost a relief after the mortifications he had just suffered.  With as much dignity and ease as he could find, Veylin walked across the chamber, rent in the ancient tumults that had wrecked Gabilgathol and Tumunzahar, and through the short passage that led to the open air.

There, outside, he fell back against the stone that had framed the long-lost door, his breath coming as if he had just climbed a steep slope.

Yes, he had fled Safna, all those years ago.  Was that not a man's final defense against the implacable will of women, to refuse a fight they could not win?  Dwarves who could not agree were stones grinding against each other.  One could always escape: to the workshop, to the road, to war . . . .  Why must he catch the fancy of the one woman who would not stay safe at home?  Where could he go, that Sút might not follow?  She had two sound legs to his one.

Not a furlong off, his pony lifted its head and gazed at him with something like curiosity, placidly chewing.

Five.  Five legs, if he could catch the beast and stay on it without a saddle.

The shrillness of that thought and the pounding of his heart made him take hold of himself.  It was not as though the woman was a dragon.  A message to Bersi would see her locked out of Gunduzahar, her goods packed and sent to Sulûnduban.  Hopefully she would make no difficulty about selling her share in the company.  If she did, he must give some cause in quarter court, and she would have the right to answer.  He hoped it would not come to that: Auð and his sept would be mortally embarrassed if Sút chose to vent her spite publicly.

Auð.  Would it be better to say as little as necessary to ensure she did not bring him together with Sút again, or ought he provide a fuller account, to guard against any claims Sút might make?

Veylin sighed and began rubbing his knee into something nearer suppleness.  There was no point in fretting over such things now.  He must see what attitude Sút took when the lads arrived, and Auð's when they rejoined the company.  She overlooked much in her friend, but surely she could not ignore the destruction of a bridge.

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Sitting in the sun and smoking atop the lookout rock, Veylin saw the lads come down the dale some hours later.  Each led a second pony, gazing earnestly about for the stonemarks that pointed the way to the house.  Veylin clambered to his feet, drawing deeply on his pipe, and waved his stick at them.

Thyrnir spotted him first, giving a great halloo and waving back before kicking his mount into a brisk trot, tugging impatiently at the head of the barebacked pony trailing behind.  When he reached the foot of the rock, the lad leapt from the saddle, crying, "You are well?"

Veylin slid the last paces down the rock and stepped into his nephew's relieved embrace.  "Now that my clothes are finally dry, but I will be better if there is food in those packs."  Oski led the pack pony, a sullen creature that would not be hurried no matter how much he stretched its neck.  "I have had nothing since last night."

"And Sút?"

Taking the pipe from his mouth, Veylin spat.  "Battered but unbowed.  Go in, Oski," he directed, as his prentice dismounted, "and see how she fares."

Bobbing his head, the Longbeard ducked beneath the cracked lintel.

"Thyrnir," Veylin said, once they were alone, "Sút and I have disagreed, irreconcilably.  I will have as little to do with her as I may."

Thyrnir did not seem much surprised.  Nodding, he asked, "Shall I tell Oski?"

"No, I will tell him myself."  After a pause, Veylin said, "I do not know what your mother will choose to do.  Sút has long been her friend.  You should be polite, but if you will take my advice, you will also be on your guard with her.  As you have seen, she is a reckless woman."

Again his nephew nodded.  "We had thought to rest here overnight and set out for the wayhouse in the morning.  There is no track and the way through the dale is very bad in places—rocky, sucking bogs.  We feared to lame the ponies, without the moon, but the clouds have scattered.  Would you rather hasten to rejoin the company?"

The lads were worn and the ponies jaded; he would not punish them for Sút's sins.  "No.  We will all travel more swiftly after sleep and food."  The presence of others should restrain Sút, and decency required that she be given a chamber of her own.  "The spring is over there, where the rushes grow.  Is your mother very distressed?"

"I had little time to see before we left.  She was shocked, of course."

Veylin hoped so.

By the time he re-entered the Riven House with Thyrnir, after the ponies were tended, Sút had already withdrawn from the broken hall.  Oski had a bright fire on the hearth, and onions and rashers of salt pork on the griddle, the scent of which wrung Veylin's empty stomach.  Thyrnir gazed up at the dripping cleft in the roof with awed unease.  "What could rend a house so?  Was it ill-delved, on a fault?  Are any of the chambers sound?"

"I do not know," Veylin replied, to the middle question.  "Was the Great Fortress ill-delved?  It too was riven in the War of Wrath, when the very Earth was split to open the Hell of Iron beneath the Mountains of Tyranny.  Much that was fair and well-made was destroyed in those days, through no fault of the makers."  What were his woes beside such tragedy?

"There are two small chambers down the surviving corridor," Oski answered, with the matter-of-factness of one whose kin had been rendered homeless by the Enemy's latest hammer blows.  "The others are flooded or choked by rubble.  Sút has taken the drier of the two.  Shall we take the other, or sleep here?"

Veylin eased himself down by the fire, glad to stretch his aching leg.  "I do not care.  You were the ones without any roof last night—do as you please, and spread my blanket beside yours.  Have you given Sút her share?"

"Yes, and one of the lanterns.  I do not know if she will join us for supper, though.  Her head is still sore," Oski said.

Veylin did not think it was her head that was sore, but at least she had given a plausible excuse for keeping apart.  "Take her a plate anyway.  She will need her strength for tomorrow's ride."

They all needed their strength for the ride, for the way was even worse than Thyrnir had said.  The rains had turned the dale's bottom to mire, and the heights above were bald rock or so steep-sided there was no getting up and down.  As they passed the wrecked bridge, later in the morning than Veylin liked, he muttered to Thyrnir, who rode beside him, "We will have to rebuild that."  Oski lagged behind, vexed by the sluggard pack-pony, and Sút kept beside him, a mum and lumpish figure made more awkward by the lack of a saddle.

Whether because of the labor rebuilding the bridge would entail, his disfavor, or their own disapproval, neither of the lads had given up their saddles, something they might have competed for, were she any other woman.

"Can it be done this winter," Thyrnir asked, "or must we wait until low water next summer?"

"I am sure we could get another slab in during the winter, but it might be better to rebuild with masonry, now that our traffic increases.  We will see what Nordri thinks."  Masonry must wait until frost was past, and the spring floods.  In the meantime, they would have to use one of the other routes between Gunduzahar and the mansion, all longer and with inconveniences of their own . . . though trifling in comparison to the difficulties of the ford that was the only remaining practicable way across Rough Beck, deeper and more tumultuous than he remembered, and the sloughs they slogged through.

They did not reach the wayhouse until the last light was fading from the hilltops, and Balnar's hail from his post beside the door was very welcome indeed.  As Veylin pried himself painfully from his saddle, Neðan and Ingi were insisting Thyrnir and Oski leave ponies and baggage to them.

Veylin left them to it and stumped doggedly up the short stair, leaning heavily on his stick.  Once he stopped, he was not sure he would be able to move again.  As he entered the passageway, the clatter of hurrying hobnails reached him barely before Auð, who flung her arms about him in as unreserved an embrace as he could remember.  Steadying himself against her, Veylin leaned his head against his sister's for a moment, then set her aside as Rekk joined them.

"We were beginning to worry," the waterwright said cheerfully.  "Were the lads laggard on the way?"

"No, the way was very bad.  You are all well?"

"Impatient, but well.  Come and have supper."

Hearing Sút's step behind him, Veylin watched to see what Auð would do.

His sister looked on her friend without a word, face profoundly grave, eyes narrowed in the close consideration that usually made Veylin squirm when it was turned his way.  Then, stepping past him, Auð took Sút by the arm and marched her ahead of him, into and through the common room to the chambers beyond.

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Note

**Obsidian** : volcanic glass, usually black in color.  Jet is soft, its color matte and dull unless highly polished; obsidian is brittle, with a glassy shine where freshly broken.  Its edges are also extremely sharp.

**Khuzd** : Khuzdul, "a Dwarf." 

**Great Fortress** : Gabilgathol, known to the Elves as Belegost, one of the two great dwarf-mansions of the Blue Mountains in the First Age. 

**"the Hell of Iron beneath the Mountains of Tyranny"** : Morgoth's fortress of Angband, beneath Thangorodrim.  Veylin would not use the Elvish names in this context. 


	11. The Innocence of Our Neighbors

_ And for these ends to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbors _

— _Preamble of the_ _Charter of the United Nations_

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Sitting with his back to the sun-warmed stone of Maelchon's house with his pipe and a jack of Fransag's ale, Grimr watched Finean forking heather up to Artan and Leod, who balanced on the roof-beams of the new shed across the barnyard, and wondered what Auð was doing.  In his mind's eye, he saw her strolling through the stalls of Sulûnduban's grand market, driving hard bargains when she found cloth she liked, or sitting by the hearth, putting the final exquisite details on one of the splendid outfits she had crafted for the celebrations of the West Council.  But he could not see her pausing to think of the hired ironsmith back in the small hall by the threatening sea. 

Grimr smiled at his own presumption and drank the good brew in his leathern cup.  It was true that the delf was duller now that so many of the company had gone home to Sulûnduban, but quiet comforts were still comforts, and he had no discontent that could not be dealt with by riding to White Cliffs a little before his appointed time.  "What do you cut the heather with?" he asked Maelchon, who sat beside him, not altogether idly. 

"Sickles," the husbandman answered, gazing on the laboring cottars with complacent satisfaction. 

Grimr nearly choked on his ale.  "Sickles!" 

Maelchon looked down on him, bushy black brows knit in mild bemusement.  "What else?" 

No wonder their sickles had been so notched and worn!  "Do you not have a billhook?" 

"Aye, but for lopping withies or branches for fodder.  Do you cut heather with a bill?" 

"I have never cut heather," Grimr confessed. 

"Ah."  Maelchon took a pull from his jack.  "Then you do not know how awkward it would be.  Or," he mused, "perhaps it is not, for Dwarves." 

Perhaps it was, for Men; they would have to stoop as low as they did when they reaped.  "Yet a sickle's edge is forged for straw and suchlike soft stuff, not the tough wood of heather." 

Grimr had heard other Men compare Maelchon to a bull, and now, meeting the husbandman's placidly watchful eye, he saw the resemblance.  "We have always used sickles to cut heather.  I will remind you, when next you work on our sickles." 

"Could you not use some sickles for heather, and others for corn?" 

Maelchon laughed and poured Grimr more ale.  "It is no use, Master.  You have already taken all I can spare in trade.  Perhaps next year." 

Suppressing a sigh, Grimr smiled civilly and drank the Man's ale.  He had not been seeking to sell Maelchon more of his work—not earnestly—but it pained him, thinking of the fine edge he had put on those blades for the harvest being used to hack heather stems . . . and of the steel that would be wasted when they must grind the sickles keen again. 

Of course, if they used their tools so, they would need him more than they might otherwise.  Still, it pained him.  "When do you expect the Lady and Dírmaen to return?" Grimr asked, to turn the subject. 

"Soon," Maelchon replied.  "The Elves' Autumn Feast lasts for three days, the Lady says, and it is at least ten days from the Havens ahorse.  Although last year, they came home in an elven ship, horses and all!" 

"Did they?  The Elves are friendly to your people, then?"  The only Elf Grimr had seen since he crossed the mountains was the marchwarden Coruwi, at the Men's harvest feast, and while the Elf had been courteous, he had not been merry and took his leave early, despite the rain.  Perhaps he had merely been ill at ease under stone with so many Dwarves, and none of his own folk beside him.  The Blue Mountain Dwarves had given the Elves ample cause for such misgivings. 

"I would not say friendly," Maelchon said, his stolid air of contentment now somewhat troubled.  "Certainly they are not as neighborly as you Dwarves.  For a time, we thought they would run us off.  They claim this land, but the Lady came to an agreement with them regarding ground-rent.  That is why she has gone to the Havens, to pay our fee." 

Auð had told him, his first night in Gunduzahar, that there was some question whether Gunduzahar was in the mountains or by the sea, but that was the last he had heard of it.  When he had heard the Men discussing their rent, he had assumed it was what they owed their own lord, not Lindon.  What else had Auð said?  That Veylin had discussed the matter with Círdan?  What, if anything, had been decided by that discussion?  It was bold indeed to establish a hall on land claimed by Elves—yet what Dwarf would pay for the right to dwell in the stone of Mahal? 

If opportunity offered, he would have to ask Bersi how things stood.  "And that is in addition to the dues you pay your lord?"  Who was their overlord?  The nearest lord of Men he knew was that cursed robber at Coldmouth, who no doubt wrung his tenants for all he could. 

Maelchon coughed, as it were discreetly, and lifted his jack.  "The Lady takes no rent, as this land is not hers, and her lord has given her ten years' grace on what is due for Srathen Brethil, so Halpan might coax our scattered folk back to their homes." 

The stone wall behind Grimr's back was not yet paid for, and his own future depended in part on how much he could sell these Men.  Traveling to Srathen Brethil would eat into his profit.  "Will you be returning to your home there?" he asked, as the husbandman drank. 

"Would I be building a proper farmstead if I were?"  Wiping his beard with the back of his hand, Maelchon gazed around his yard, at cowshed and hayrick, the pen where the horse with the weak white feet lounged hoof-cocked and the new shed.  "The sea does not speak to me, and the gales are a trial, but the land here is better than what I had in Srathen Brethil and there is enough for all my sons to have their own.  Perhaps I will send Gormal to Srathen Brethil to hold our steading in a year or two; one of the lads may get a wife who does not like being far from her kin." 

This was how the Men of Dale had spoken over their cups when fortune favored them, though prenticeships and places with prosperous traders were what they had sought for their sons.  But was not farming also a craft, and some land, like some mines, better than others?  "Speaking of wives, does yours have any butter she would like to sell?  Or cheese?" 

Maelchon smiled.  "I believe so, but you should speak to her.  Fransag!" he bellowed, turning his head towards the door. 

His stout goodwife came out, frowning as she wiped her hands on her skirts.  "Hae ye drained the stoup already?" 

"No, lass.  Master Grimr was wondering if you had any butter or cheese to spare." 

"Some.  The best of the season is past.  Hae ye not put up enough for the winter?" Fransag asked, with somewhat of disapproval. 

Grimr smiled.  "We have, Mistress, but sweet butter and green cheese is a treat, so long as it lasts.  If you want all you have, we will not go without."  With Bersa in the kitchen, there was little danger of their stocks running low.  Famine was the fat cook's greatest fear.  Knowing how much of the Men's produce he had sold Bersa over the quarter since he came to Gunduzahar, Grimr could contemplate the onset of winter without worry for the first time in many, many years. 

"Da!  Da!" cried Maelchon's elder daughter, running across the farmyard. 

"What is it, my rose?" the husbandman asked, as the child came pelting up, breathless but smiling. 

"Donnan and Blackie are home!" 

"Donnan and Blackie—" Fransag repeated, frowning as if at nonsense, then her puzzlement fled.  "By the Mother, it will be the Lady.  Your pardon, Master," she asked, giving Grimr a quick bob, and bolted back into the house. 

"The stoup is still half-full," Maelchon called after her.  "Have we enough to ask them to dinner?" 

"Dinna be a gowk!" came the muffled response from within.  "She willna put off seein' Rian so long." 

Grimr considered taking his leave, but he could already hear horses approaching on the river track and settled back with his pipe.  Fresh news would be even more welcome in the delf than fresh butter. 

"Ho, lads!" Maelchon called out to the cottars working on the shed.  "Come down, and greet the Lady!" 

It was a very modest cavalcade for the attention.  The Lady Saelon rode at the head on a fine-looking bay, while Dírmaen followed on his brown, leading a string of four horses, only one of which bore any packs.  Grimr recognized Maelchon's two strapping workbeasts, whose packsaddles were bare; they trotted briskly into the yard, heads up and ears pricked, snuffing the familiar scents of home. 

"Welcome, Lady!" Maelchon called out, rising and coming forward to greet her . . . or his horses.  "How was your journey?" 

"Well met, Maelchon!  Long," the Lady said, "but not unpleasant.  Thank you, Artan," she said, as one of the blond brothers took her horse's head.  "How have you all fared here?" 

"Very well," Maelchon assured her.  "Will you light down and take a cup, or something more?" 

"Gladly!  Indeed, I am happy to be near enough to walk the rest of the way." 

Dírmaen, swinging down from his mount, appeared to sigh. 

"I am sure I ken how ye feel," Fransag said, coming out with another stoup, a wooden cup like a small bowl, and another jack.  "Sit ye down, Lady.  And you, Dírmaen.  Will ye take a bite, as well as a drop?" 

"That would be very welcome," the Man of the Star replied. 

"Here, sir."  Finean took the lead-line.  "I will see to the horses." 

Dírmaen gratefully clapped him on the shoulder and came to join his betrothed.  Or his wife, for a time, if drunken tattle was to be believed.  Had they truly traveled to Lindon and back without any other companions?  That did not look much like betrothal. 

Yet the Lady was not in the least self-conscious.  "Master Grimr!" she exclaimed, smiling and taking Maelchon's place on the bench.  "Greetings!  All is well in Gunduzahar, I hope." 

Grimr bowed his head and slid to the end of the bench to make room for Dírmaen.  "At your service, Lady.  Yes, all goes well with us in Gunduzahar." 

"Were the Elves content, Lady?" Maelchon asked, as his goodwife served the ale. 

"Thank you, Fransag."  The Lady Saelon took the carved cup.  "Yes, they were satisfied with our rent," she assured the husbandman before drinking.  "That is to say," she elaborated, tartly droll, once she had slaked her first thirst, "those who are amiable were even more amiable, while those who are not kept other company." 

"Rest easy," Dírmaen told Maelchon, who began to look uneasy, as he sat down between Grimr and the Lady with his jack.  "The Lord Círdan was very gracious." 

"He did not send you home in a ship." 

"He offered," Saelon replied.  "But we chose to return as we went.  That is too much kindness to accept, year after year," she maintained, meeting Fransag's knowing smirk with bland assurance. 

"We need not worry about it next year," Dírmaen spoke, drawing attention from the women.  "Círdan will come here a fortnight before Yáviérë, which will spare us the journey." 

Maelchon moved restively, like one of his horses being shod.  "Why is he coming here?" 

"He wishes to see our settlement for himself," the Lady answered.  "He has not been to these lands for many years, he says.  I believe," she leaned forward, peering at Grimr past Dírmaen, "there is also some question of whether this land should be reckoned as mountains or as shore." 

"So I have heard, Lady," Grimr said cautiously, unsure where this might lead.  "Heard, but no more.  I have not been at Gunduzahar long." 

"Be sure to tell Master Veylin of Círdan's visit," Dírmaen told him brusquely. 

"Veylin left for Sulûnduban a week ago, and we do not expect his return until the end of Nénimë, or later." 

"Do not be ill-tempered," Saelon told the Man of the Star, sounding very much like a spouse.  "So Veylin told me, Master Grimr.  But if you or anyone else in your company has reason to send him messages, pray mention this.  I am certain he would want to know." 

Grimr was certain, too.  "I will, Lady." 

"What does it matter whether the land is reckoned as mountains or shore?" Maelchon pressed, at a loss. 

"That is a matter between Dwarves and the Elves," the Lady answered.  "It does not concern us.  Círdan and Veylin have both assured me so." 

"What is this Círdan like?" Fransag asked, eyes narrow and lips pursed.  "Is he like Gwinnor, or Coruwi?" 

Saelon sat back against the stone of the wall.  "Neither.  I cannot tell you, for I have never met anyone he might be compared to.  Can you imagine a greybeard Elf?  That is his appearance.  Surely you recall something of him from my tales of the Elder Days?" 

"There was a lord of the coast by that name, was there not?" Maelchon hazarded. 

"Who helped Eärendil build the Foam-flower, Da!" Ros prompted, from where she hung about her father. 

Fransag reached over and swatted her daughter.  "Whisht, chiel, when your elders are speaking!" 

Saelon held out her hand to the girl, drawing her to her.  "Yes, Ros—the very same Shipwright.  For that is what Círdan means in Elvish.  When first I met him, he was shaping timbers for a ship." 

"A white ship, like a great swan?" 

"Perhaps.  The prow was very like a swan's neck, but it was still being built." 

"And did he not fight with Gil-galad and Elendil against the Enemy?" 

"He did." 

Fransag snorted.  "I did not ask for fireside tales." 

"There is good metal in fireside tales, Mistress," Grimr said.  "My kin were at the Battle of Dagorlad, and we are told that Círdan was there, as well as Elrond.  Since he seldom leaves the coast and our ancient homes were far from the sea, I know little else of him.  I had not heard," Grimr glanced skeptically at Saelon, "that he was bearded." 

"'An Elf who is a craftsman and has a beard,' that is how Veylin described him to me," she maintained. 

"It is true," Dírmaen said plainly.  "It is very strange, but true." 

"Well!  Such things we have seen since we left Srathen Brethil," Maelchon muttered.  "Troll-demons and Fair Folk and Dwarves a-plenty.  I hope it will not be dragons next." 

Such innocents these Men were.  Grimr drained his jack.  He would not say what he might about dragons, even though it rankled to be included among the creatures Maelchon found uncanny.  "Thank you for the ale, Maelchon.  Since you have no work for me, I will be on my way." 

"Wait!" Fransag urged.  "Ye wished to truck for butter." 

Grimr looked at her, head canted.  "You do have some you would part with?" 

"Aye.  Will ye step into the hoose, so ye can see wha I have?  Ros, run to the burn and fetch the butter-box." 

He would remember that her severity might be a mask over eagerness to trade.  "Certainly, Mistress." 

"Forgif my man," the goodwife asked, once they were within, as she crossed the chamber to fetch a large basket.  "He is a semple creature, and can be a gowk.  Yer folk hae been naught but good to us." 

Grimr bowed.  "My fellows speak well of your hospitality, Mistress."  And of her fortitude, but he would not remind her of evil things, not under the roof that had witnessed them. 

Heaving the basket onto a bench, Fransag huffed.  "I hope I hae the wit to follow the Lady's lead.  Noo, here are hazelnuts, and some of the ferst sloes.  Hae ye any use for them, as well as the butter?" 

"Perhaps."  It was not a question of whether he had a use for them, but of whether Bersa would.  After haggling with the greedy cook the first few times, Grimr had negotiated a fixed price for the commoner produce, which allowed him to say, "The usual price for butter?" 

"I dinna know . . . .  It grows dearer as the leaves drop," Fransag pointed out.  "Mebee if ye take the rest.  If I hae any to spare when next ye come, though, ye must pay more." 

"That is fair dealing, Mistress.  What do you ask for the rest?" 

She looked over her goods as if appraising them for the first time, lips pursed.  "Twa pennies." 

"Two?"  Bersa was not the only one who was greedy.  Grimr stepped forward and hefted the basket, gauging its weight.  Near two stone.  "No, that is too much.  Half a pence is more like." 

"Nordri reckons so much barley at three," the goodwife countered, frown returning. 

"That may be, but corn packs more tightly and there is no shell."  Reaching in, Grimr drew out a nut and smacked it on the bench to crack it, considering the size of the meat.  "We have no use for the shells, Mistress, and there is the trouble of opening them." 

"D'ye say ye want them shelled?" she asked.  "They will not keep long so." 

"No, they will not.  But I do not think the first of the season will reach the storerooms."  If Bersa would not give him a decent price, others would, for the treat of fresh plump nutmeats as they sat about the hearth of an evening.  Or it might be worth sharing them freely with the prentices and his fellow hirelings, for the good will it would buy him. 

"What of the sloes?" 

"What of them, Mistress?  They are not to everyone's taste."  The only uses he knew for them were as flavoring for spirits, or stewed once drying had taken the bite from their flesh. 

Fransag sniffed.  "Weel, if ye dinna want them, ye will hae to gie me more for the butter." 

"Let me see how much butter there is," Grimr said, "and then I will decide." 

While waiting for Ros to return, he ate the hazelnut he had opened—the meat was small, but the flavor very fine—and looked about.  This was the first time he had been invited into the house; indeed, one of the few times he had been under a common Man's roof, west of Mirkwood.  He doubted the house itself was common, Nordri and Grani having built it, though its outer form was not unlike what he had seen elsewhere. 

This chamber, which looked to serve them as common room and kitchen, took up most of the space within, and like all Men's houses, even those of the lordly, it was meanly furnished.  A few benches no better than what sat outside the door ranged down the sides along a central floor-hearth; even on so fine a day as this, when the door and small windows stood open, its smoke coiled in the rafters about strings of fish and joints of meat.  A small trestle table, some crude chests and tubs . . . little else there was of joinery, and none of it Grani or Thyrnir's work. 

Indeed, there was more of his own craft about the place, or at least the part that served as kitchen: a goodly set of spits and several griddles, as well a pair of bronze cooking pots, the smaller of which looked like Bersi's work.  Yet that hung over the fire by a hook on a stout frame.  "You do not have a pot-chain, Mistress?"  The Lady had one in the hall; a fine one, made by Veylin's cousins, he had been told. 

"Nae yet."  The goodwife regarded him with narrowed eyes.  "Wha would ye ask for yin?" 

Grimr considered the distance from the roof-beam to the fire.  The metal alone would be more than a shilling, and chains took much forging.  It would be long before the small copper and occasional penny that he had given into her hands added up to so much.  "Thirty pence, or five well-fleshed beeves." 

There might have been resignation as well as surprise in her grunt, but her daughter trotted in then, hugging the butter-box close, though it was still wet from the river that kept it cool.  "Gie it to Master Grimr, chiel." 

Less than half a stone; nearer five pounds without the box.  Something more than a farthing's worth, and a bawbee for the nuts . . . .  "Will you take a penny for the lot?" 

"Master Grimr," Fransag reproached.  "Whoo am I iver to gie ye thirty pennies, if ye do nae gie them to me ferst?  A penny an' a half." 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**Gowk** : Scots, fool.

" **a wooden cup like a small bowl** ": this is a quaich, a broad, shallow cup with flat handles on opposite sides and no foot..

**Whisht** : Scots, "be quiet!"

**Yin** : Scots, one.

**Bawbee** : half a pence.


	12. Wayward Sister

__             And they lie like wedges,   
__ Thick end to thin end and thin end to thick end,  
_ And are a figure of the way the strong  
_ __ Of mind and strong of arm should fit together

—Robert Frost, "New Hampshire" 

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Auð found more people abroad than was usual at this early hour as she came down the stair from the First Hall to the First Deep, but due to the accident at the bridge, they were not among the earliest to come in for the Council.  There was much to do to prepare for their guests from Barazdush and Furnace Fells—which is why she was hurrying along with the coal-carriers, bakers' lads, and prentices who did not board at their masters'.  It would have been pleasant to lie abed a little longer, after the deprivations on the road, or virtuous to begin unpacking the jumbled heaps of chests in her hall, but if she were to speak privately with Veylin, such things must wait.  His days would be even fuller than her own. 

Taking the street to the right at the fountain, she went by the grand blue-figured doors where the way divided—two lads stood there with buckets and cloths, while a third carefully set a padded ladder against the soot-shadowed enamels—and passed Slettr and Forða's shops, closed at this hour.  Three more doors on the left, by the lamp with the copper wren clinging to its chain, was the plain wooden door of the lampkeeper's closet.  Here she paused long enough to find its simple key on her ring, then opened the door and went in. 

She had not been here since some months before her marriage, yet nothing had changed: the jars of oil neatly lined up along the left-hand wall; the dipper and long-spouted can, coils of wick and clippers and other oddments on the shelves ahead.  After assuring herself that all was in its place, Auð shut and relocked the door behind her, then, in the blind dark, reached up beside the shelf for the lever that opened the panel over the concealed door.  When the panel slipped almost silently aside, her hand went to the door's lock plate with the key that could be mistaken for no other and, murmuring the spell her father had taught her long ago, she opened the passage that led directly to the family suite within Thrir's Hall. 

When she walked into the kitchen, she startled the still bleary-looking Oski considerably with her cheerful "Good morning!" 

"A good morning to you as well, Auð," the Longbeard replied, taking refuge in formality.  "I am not sure whether Veylin has risen.  Have you come for breakfast?" the lad asked, with something like alarm.  "If so, I was not told to expect you." 

"Yes, I have come for breakfast, but do not trouble yourself.  Have you seen your parents yet?" 

"No." 

Auð set her bag on the table and took the kettle he had been filling from him.  "Then go and breakfast with them.  They will be glad to see you." 

"But—" Oski began, then, as his wits woke, he let the kettle go.  "As you wish," he murmured, bowing.  "He wished to be out of the hall by the seventh hour." 

"I will not detain him," she assured the lad.  "Go and reassure your mother!" 

Once he had left, she finished filling the kettle and put it on the fire, which was just beginning to throw heat.  There was another pot on the hob; lifting the lid, she found oats soaking for porridge.  Snorting, she put the lid back and headed for the pantry.  She found a bachelor's larder, lacking much, but she had expected no better, especially after their long absence, and had made her own provisions. 

Working in this kitchen was a deep comfort: girl and maid, she had labored here nearly twice as long as she had in the kitchen she now called her own, and her hands found what they sought almost without thought.  A few things had been moved, enough to throw the familiarity into relief yet not so many that it spoilt remembrance.  Here was the green-glazed bowl she had always loved; and when the grinder jammed, she knew just where to smack it to free the gears. 

She had opened the door, to have warning of Veylin's approach, and when she heard the door at the end of the hall open, Auð emptied the hot water from the mugs it had warmed and poured the coffee. 

Memory whetted to keenness, the sound of her brother's step grated, for her heart heard one thing and her ears another.  Indeed, his tread was even slower and more halting than usual and, as he approached, she could hear the firm tap as he grounded his stick before leaning on it. 

So he had walked for months, when he first regained his feet . . . and after slaying the fiend that maimed him.  With the latter, the dignity of satisfied vengeance had given him pride enough to discount his infirmity.  Yet it was now plain that his leg was what it was, and would mend no more, not in this life.  Its weakness might be less aggravated if he settled here, as so many wished, and roamed no further than Regin's council chamber, but she herself had given up wishing any such thing, or even wishing that Veylin might come to desire a quieter life.  For that would be, in him, a sign of graver weakness, the laming of his wide-ranging soul. 

Still, a debt was owing for this increase in pain.  Auð wanted it paid, so her heart was not divided. 

As he stepped into the doorway, in a tone that might tip towards either complaisance or wrath, Veylin rumbled, "I said I wanted porridge." 

"You need more that that, if you mean to make up for the days you have lost," Auð declared, setting his mug on the table before the settle, already set for two.  "Sit and drink your coffee while I flip the griddlecakes." 

He stared at her, surprise flattened—no good sign.  "Where is Oski?" 

"I sent him to breakfast with his parents.  If you would rather have him back, I will go fetch him." 

"No," Veylin said promptly, face easing, but not into pleasure.  "No.  Your griddlecakes will be an indulgence.  Is that ham or bacon I smell?" 

Even for her, he made the effort to walk more naturally, and he was dressed for meeting the other chieftains or his ealdormen.  "Ham.  Would you like an egg as well?" 

"This begins to sound dire," he said, not altogether lightly, hesitating beside the chair. 

"Someone should be grateful for your efforts!" 

That seemed to reassure him, for he sat and took up the coffee.  "You're welcome." 

Auð turned to the fire, to flip the griddlecakes.  "Has Sút not thanked you?" she asked, uncertainly.  Perhaps it would be better to speak of this after he had eaten.  Though now that the subject had been touched on, it would hang over the table, waiting. 

Veylin considered carefully before answering.  "No." 

Stirring the batter, Auð frowned.  "Do you think she hit her head in the fall?  She has not been herself since." 

Was that a huff, or was he blowing on his coffee?  "I found her wits as sound as ever they were the next day." 

"She spoke to you?"  Sút had not spoken to her, save for muttering about a sore head. 

"She has told you nothing?" 

"About what?"  Was there more than her outrageous behavior upon the bridge? 

Veylin took a draught of coffee.  "Finish cooking the griddlecakes.  I do not want them burned because you were distracted." 

Auð shut her mouth and tended to the griddle.  Once she had set his plate down before him, she straightened his collar where it was rumpled in the back.  "You look very fine."  In truth, he looked worn, and this silence was more like the husbanding of strength than she cared for. 

"Thjalfi has asked me to step round early, and the ealdormen will be here soon after." 

"Have any grave matters arisen since Midsummer?"  She went back to the hearth and poured batter for more griddlecakes. 

"Not that I have heard.  Though that may be why Thjalfi wishes to see me so soon." 

And she was troubling him with Sút earlier still.  A host of offers came to mind: her unpacking could wait while she saw to preparations for the sept council, or at least stocked his pantry for him . . . yet further solicitude was sure to make him surly, suggesting he was incapable of managing such things himself.  What a pity that he had never found a suitable spouse, who would have kept such chores from him.  A widowed daughter's place in her father's house was always dubious, a reproach to her husband's kin and a deeply rooted rival to the woman who had come in—or who would.  Duna, Vitnir's wife, openly mourned that Thrir's Hall was so often shut up, Auð knew.  The woman could not be blamed for that, nor for wishing her son to grow up in the hall that would one day be his, no matter how much Veylin disliked her. 

There was one responsibility, however, that no one could fault Auð for taking to herself.  Before she sat down to her own breakfast, she poured Veylin more coffee and forked a second slice of ham onto his plate.  "Tell me all you will of Sút, so I may tend to her." 

"As you wish," Veylin said, ominously collected.  "Do it for your own sake, however.  Since I have done with her, it spares me nothing." 

"Her behavior was shocking," Auð admitted.  "Indefensible.  I cannot understand what she was about, on the bridge.  Has she refused to pay for its repair?"  That Veylin was angry about the damage and the inconvenience it would cause, Auð understood.  But that he had declared himself irreconcilable seemed out of proportion to the offense, serious though it was. 

Yet Sút was not so wealthy as she took pains to appear, and her time in Gunduzahar had brought her no profit.  She might not be able to pay for her foolishness. 

"It would be fitting if she offered to do so, but I do not count on it.  We will take her share in Gunduzahar as recompense.  Besides, Nordri and Nyr have undertaken to put a masonry bridge in its place, in hopes of convincing Eigsa and Rond to come to Gunduzahar.  I doubt," Veylin muttered, regarding her, uncertain and apprehensive, over the rim of his mug, "we will get any woman across there otherwise.  You would not like to cross it again, if there were only a slab, would you?" 

She could still see the stone tipping, clearly in her mind's eye.  "Liking has nothing to do with it, if that is the best way.  I will go as you guide me, when we are on the road.  What was your quarrel then, if not over the ruin of the  bridge?" she insisted, refusing diversion. 

Though he must have contemplated how to tell her for the better part of three days, while they rode—and perhaps, given his weariness, for the worst part of three nights as well—his answer was not ready.  Finally, face somber and eyes searching, he said, "Did you know that Sút desired to be my spouse?" 

Auð stared, fork poised.  Surely she had misheard, or he had misspoke.  "What?" 

Veylin's face eased somewhat.  "Sút desired to be my spouse." 

"No."  It could not be.  They had always chafed one another, to her vexation and grief.  How happy she would have been, if they had been more congenial! 

Yet as her thoughts scattered like startled birds, she found she could not imagine Sút as mistress of Thrir's Hall, in her mother's place. 

"I do assure you," Veylin replied solemnly, and there was no glimmer of warmth or wit in those russet eyes.  "There was no mistaking her." 

She did not doubt him.  Sút did nothing by half measures, and few knew better than Auð how audacious the woman could be in pursuit of her desires.  Indeed, Auð's mind flinched from speculation on what may have passed between her brother and her ardent friend.  Mutual weakness and the raw chill of the night must have forced intimacy upon them, and they alone together . . . . 

If the offense had been moderate, Veylin would be vociferous in complaint.  So sparing an account, so summary a decision, declared the details unspeakable.  Auð found she could not meet his eyes. 

"I do not ask you to break with her," her brother went on.  "You have been friends since before I was born.  All I ask is that you do not bring us together, so far as it is in your power to prevent." 

Auð nodded.  His clemency shamed her.  Who was to blame but herself?  She was the one who had invited Sút to Gunduzahar; who always made light of everyone's reservations about her friend's eccentricities . . . whose duty it was to guard her younger sibling.  Mother had disapproved of Sút: for her lack of restraint, certainly; but had she also seen that she had designs on Veylin? 

Auð was mortified that she could be so blind. 

Rising from the table, she gathered up the plates, though she had not finished eating; could not., her stomach clenched as it was.  "Will you finish the coffee?" she asked, grasping at commonplaces for comfort and safety.  Anything else was too likely to cause pain or misunderstanding.  She must think about this, privily and deeply. 

"Of course.  Oski's brew is nothing to yours." 

Washing up was but another refuge, as Veylin sat, silent as their father had often been, finishing his coffee.  No doubt he was considering the councils before him, as Father had. 

So she was startled when, as she furiously scrubbed at a stubborn crust on the griddle, Veylin loomed up beside her, reaching out to pluck the green bowl from the rack.  "What are you doing?" she snapped, only then taking in the towel in his hand. 

"You wash, I dry," he answered, as he had when they were children, wiping the bowl and setting it on the board. 

She glowered at him, to keep back tears.  "You will spot your coat.  And Thjalfi is waiting." 

"We did not appoint a particular time."  Veylin reached over and snagged an apron from its hook.  "If my time is short, it may encourage him to be brief.  But I will let you put all away when I have done." 

She had nearly finished, but it was good to stand shoulder to shoulder with him for a while, working together as they had of old.  When he gave the kettle a last swipe and handed it to her, to hang on the hook by the hearth, he leaned in and kissed her cheek.  "Thank you, Auð.  I will face the day in better heart." 

She wished she could say the same.  "That I am glad for.  Off with you now!  I must get back to my own work." 

"Then come—I will see you as far as the fountain." 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Shifting the bundle under her arm, Auð hammered more emphatically on the door, ignoring the stares of passersby.  "Sút," she threatened, in a tone calculated to carry through the stout oak, "if you do not open the door, I will give this suit to Safna.  As you said, Hylli's eye is drawn to silver."  Twice before she had come to Sút's apartments, with the sumptuous sable and silver brocade garments.  If she got no answer this time, she would leave off trying. 

The first time was the day after she spoke with Veylin.  She had not seen him since: they both had much to do and many people to see, and she was grateful for the separation.  The knot in her heart was horribly snarled, difficult to disentangle without snapping one of the threads. 

Auð knew which was stronger.  Perhaps Sút did, too, and that was why she did not answer the knock on her door. 

Guna and Meiri, passing, stared, and Guna leaned her head over to murmur in her cousin's ear. 

Word of Sút's fall had traveled fast.  Auð turned her head to give them a lingering look of forbidding dignity. 

"Do not make it worse," Sút said quietly behind her, as Auð finally saw the two around the corner.  "For your own sake.  Give me the suit and go." 

Clamping her elbow down on the parcel before Sút could pull it away, Auð jammed her foot between the door and the jamb.  "I will speak to you, Sút.  Here, or within." 

Sút was disheveled, as though she had wholly given way to carelessness, stray strands of hair fuzzing her braids; there were even crumbs in her beard.  Eyes sunken in dark hollows, she gazed at Auð without expression.  Was this shame, or enmity?  "You can say what you will here." 

"Why did you not tell me?" 

This was her most pressing question, the thing she could not understand.  She might have aided Sút in so many ways, for she had always had her brother's ear . . . and who knew his tastes better?  Even Mother she might have worked upon, if there had been hope, for how was a woman to get a sister, if not by marriage?  Veylin would have had a helpmate and heirs of his body; she would have had nephews, and perhaps a niece who delighted in stitchery; Thyrnir and Thyrð close cousins—and children would have steadied Sút, giving her quicksilver mind ample occupation and true purpose.  Who could be rash with a precious babe in their arms? 

So Auð's heart insisted.  Yet her mind had its doubts, and the longer she stood there under Sút's flat black gaze, the stronger they became. 

"I did not know," Sút finally said.  "Not until he had gone to the Iron Hills.  When he returned, it was too late." 

Too late.  Not for Veylin, perhaps, but certainly for Sút, nearly a decade his senior.  Not too late to get children, but too late to begin a chancy courtship with many obstacles to overcome that might lead so far.  All those years, wasted years.  Auð held out the beautiful garments she had made for her friend.  "That is why you hate Safna." 

Sút nodded.  "Keep them," she said, pushing the bundle back.  "I will not be wearing them." 

More waste.  "Ill luck might strike anyone, and ponies are fractious.  If you withdraw, you admit blame.  Do you wish to be shunned?" 

"I do not care." 

Auð scowled, wishing she could punch her, as she did when they were girls.  "You will care when no one comes to buy your silver.  Do not be more of a fool than you have already!" 

"You are good, Auð; too good.  You always were.  Go home.  You have wasted enough of your time on me." 

"I must judge that for myself.  Tell me," Auð challenged, "how am I to know this is not wits cracked by a rock when you fell?" 

"Ask your brother.  I am sure he will content you."  Sút began to draw her door shut, setting her foot against Auð's to push it out of the way. 

"No, he will not.  All he will say is that you desired him, and all he has asked is that I do not bring the two of you together." 

"All.  Do not be cruel, Auð.  Farewell." 

"You paid me for this—you must take it!" Auð cried, thrusting the suit through the relentlessly narrowing gap.  One hand braced on jamb and the other hauling on door handle, Sút could not prevent . . . but with a furious surge, the door slammed shut, almost crushing Auð's toes. 

Standing there, staring at the shut door, Auð's heart raged: at the senselessness of fate, since those who had destroyed her comfort were those dearest to her, after her sons.  How was she to decide where blame lay, if blame there was, when neither would give her grounds to choose between them?  "You may shut your door on me," she called, "but I will not shut my door on you!" 

She might not—but the door to Gunduzahar would be closed in Sút's face.  If she returned there, she would not see Sút again. 

 * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * 

Notes

**Hob** : a ledge at the side or back of a fireplace, used to keep dishes warm.

" **how was a woman to get a sister, if not by marriage?** ": Dwarves rarely had more than two or three children (HoME XII: _The Peoples of Middle-earth_ , "The Making of Appendix A," (IV) Durin's Folk), and there were about two dwarf-men for each dwarf-woman ( _LotR_ , Appendix A.III, "Durin's Folk").  It follows, therefore, that is was rare for a dwarf-woman to have a birth-sister.


	13. Taking Counsel

_ There is no better ballast for keeping a mind steady on its keel, and saving it from all risk of crankiness, than business. _

—James Russell Lowell, _Literary Essays_ : "New England Two Centuries Ago"

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

The Council's days were full and long, with many considerable matters before them.  The desirability of altering the weight or purity of pennies was argued with profound passion for three of the first four days around the broad ring of oak beneath the keystone of Regin's Great Hall of Council.  Oakenshield insisted that Durin's measures be respected, while the Broadbeam's king, Hilmir, repeatedly—a hammer beating on stubborn steel—pragmatically observed that clipping was rife since the price of wheat had risen from eight pennies to a shilling the bushel.  Three days, and much of the intervening nights, between the courses of lavish feast and counterfeast, and over flagons of wine and ale, seeking agreement enough to act upon.

The division of responsibility for maintaining the Blue Mountain road and the causeways towards Tharbad, pressing in light of the poor harvest here in the north, was dealt with more briskly, but led naturally to somber discussion of the advisability of well-armed companies beyond Sarn Ford.  Gondor's law had retreated further from the Fords of Isen, though Saruman held Orthanc in the name of the Stewards, as he had for the last ninety years.  As naturally, the mention of the wizard's name sparked scowls and sour words from Thorin and his chieftains, who had found him a disagreeable neighbor in Dunland.  High tolls he charged for the crossing of the Isen, and sold weapons to Men on both sides of the mountains at prices their own smithies could not match.

Veylin remembered his passage through the Gap of Rohan twenty-five years before well, but not favorably.  After very profitable trading in Gondor, where he had got many fine pigeon's blood rubies from beyond Khand and learned to love the equally rich red wines of Belfalas, the Rohirrim had seemed uncouth and poor.  Suspicious of Dwarves, too: partly on account of Scatha's teeth, yet some also muttered that Dwarves had supplied the weapons Dunlendings used to drive the Rohirrim into Helm's Deep during the Long Winter of cursed memory.

The Dunlendings, for their part, were even poorer, sullen still after bitter defeat, the cup of victory dashed from their lips.  There Veylin had overheard that Dwarvish smiths armed the defenders of the Hornburg and those who slew Wulf.

Little wonder Thráin had brought his people away from there, for in truth few Dwarves dwelt or traded so near the ruin of Khazad-dûm at the time of the Long Winter, when the Longbeards were fat and prosperous in Erebor's Mountain far to the east, while in the Blue Mountains, Firebeards and Broadbeams dug deeper to house their own outlying folk, harried by Orcs and falling back on their ancestral strongholds.  From his seat by his friend Tregr, chieftain of the Broadbeam's youngest line, Veylin watched disapprovingly as Thorin, a mere child at that time of trouble, told Regin Reborn and Hilmir, nearing his second century, what would be wise.

Thráin should have put off his quest for vengeance until his son was fit to lead his folk.  However, he had not, and so they must listen to Thorin, beaten to brittleness by the burdens upon him, prate pompously upon the dignity of Durin's Line and what was due to him as Durin's heir.  How Regin bore it, Veylin did not know.  If Thyrnir or Thyrð's sons gave themselves such airs, he would boot their backsides.

"What of the Elves?" Thorin proposed, when Thjalfi tartly reminded him that, after Azanulbizar, there were few men who could be spared for work on the fenland causeways, so far from their mansions.  "Their wine comes from Belfalas, does it not?  They, too, have an interest in the road."

"We do not deal with Elves," Grytr, chieftain of the sept nearest Hilmir's line, replied, guttural as a growl.  The fathers of his fathers had dwelt in Tumunzahar.

"Some of you do," Oakenshield chopped back, turning to gaze on Veylin.

"There are mariners at the Havens," Veylin said, though it should be self-evident.  "They bring their wine around the coast from Dol Amroth."  With less trouble and in better condition than any that traveled by land, which is why he bought his when he was in Mithlond.

Hilmir scratched his chin through his bushy brown beard, keeping a guarded eye on Grytr as he wondered, grudgingly, "Do they carry corn the same way?"

"I do not know.  I doubt it, for they use little, and strange kinds.  Did Thranduil get much corn from the Men of Dale?"

One-eyed Thili, deeply scarred in Dimrill Dale, who sat at Thorin's right hand, shook his head.  "Not that I heard.  Wine in plenty, and butter, and plump sweet apples—better than their own bitter woodland crabs!—but little wheat and no barley.  Elves prefer mead and wine to ale."

"Even if the Elves of the Havens traded in corn," Holl rebuked Veylin, from where he sat on the other side of Thjalfi, "would they be likely to give us a good price, when you have stirred them up?"

If only Holl were beside him, so he could have strangled his gabble!  Or at least thwacked his shins with his stick, under the table.  "I did not stir them up," Veylin countered firmly, mustering all his composure under the suddenly sharp eyes of three kings and eight chieftains, as well as the heirs and ealdormen sitting in attentive silence on their benches along the walls.  "It was the Men who came, fiend-driven, to the sea's shore that roused the Elves from their torpor."

"Men you have befriended," Grytr said, as if in accusation.

"I am a friend to the Lady Saelon at White Cliffs, who saved my life," Veylin confessed, unashamed of the fact.  "She has contented the Shipwright on her folk's behalf—and," Veylin cut Holl off before he betrayed still more of his business, "I have spoken with him regarding certain disagreements about my company's use of timber and game."

Tregr mouth twitched, a twinkle in his eye.  "Were they civil words?"

"Clearly," Veylin said, regarding his friend with amiable contempt, "you have never met the Shipwright."

"Is he so formidable?" Thili asked curiously.

"He is not to be taken lightly," Hilmir declared, and his gaze, as it lingered on Veylin, was displeased, at their levity or the prospect of a dispute with Lindon.  Or both.

"Indeed," Regin agreed, pushing back his seat and rising.  "A break is in order, I think.  Let us return in . . . half an hour, and then perhaps we can come back to matters easier to resolve, such as whether it is just to levy poll taxes on Longbeards in our mansions.  Thorin, will you take some wine?"

A near brush, and an all-too-obvious deflection, which would do more to call attention to his dealings with Lindon than all the rumors traded before the Council began.  Still, Veylin was relieved to see it was Holl whom Regin drew aside for a private word before they reconvened rather than himself.

Later, it seemed his chastening was merely deferred, for Regin, smiling, seated him by Oakenshield at supper, and on the dais, so that their cordiality—or lack thereof—would be on full display before the crowded hall.  The excellent food and wine helped Veylin swallow this dubious honor and keep up courtesy; better still, a happy inspiration led him to ask Thorin about the relations between Longbeards and Men in the Second Age, a subject which positively invited Oakenshield to regale him with Khazad-dûm's ancient power and glory—tales not only of their influence over Men, but of the works they accomplished in partnership with the Noldor of Eregion.

"Do you know Gwinnor Tinnath?" Veylin asked, as Thorin passed him the partridge pie.  "Vingenáro Tinwi, he may have been called in Eregion.  He was a gemsmith there, in the following of Galadriel; before the drowning of Beleriand, he was with Felagund in Nulukkhizdîn."

Thorin paused briefly, spoon poised over the poached pears.  "No," he replied dismissively.  "I have never heard of him."

Biting his lip until he could school his tongue, Veylin contented himself with, "I am sorry to hear it, for now he dwells in Mithlond.  I thought he might be useful, if you wished to trade with the Elves."

That woke Oakenshield's interest.  "That is a good thought!  I had heard few of the Noldor were left this side of the sea, and thought most of the folk of Eregion who remained dwelt with Elrond in Rivendell.  If I speak to this Gwinnor, may I say I have your recommendation?"

"Certainly."  Veylin smiled to think of a meeting between the supercilious-seeming Noldor and this gravely haughty young king, but he would take care not to be present, should it come to pass.

He managed to get through the rest of the evening without giving offense or taking much, but he took his leave soon after the dancing began and did not scruple to lean heavily on his stick as he went.  Let Oakenshield misjudge him, if he would.  Veylin preferred his unfriends to do so.

There was no escaping Regin's shrewd eye, however.  "Have you done something to your leg?" he asked, as they passed on the steps of the dais, Regin bounding up to snatch a drink before the next set.

"No—it is the weather, I believe."  There were torrential rains without and, truthfully, he had felt a twinge or two in his knee.  "I will soak it, and it should be better in the morning."

"I am glad it is no worse," his king said in a tone of concern that could be read two ways, his eyes profoundly knowing.  "I had hoped to speak with you later.  May I come visit you—" he considered "—around the eleventh hour?  I would not rush your care of your leg."

"Whenever is convenient, my king."

Regin clouted him on the shoulder, not unkindly, and hastened towards his cup.

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Having left the doors to his study ajar in anticipation of Regin's visit, Veylin heard the jovial din as Brodi and Tregr returned from the feast.  Having almost no household of his own, he was always happy to oblige Tregr by finding room for him as well, there being no fifth sept of the Firebeards to host him.  Ordinarily, he would be coming in with them, roaring with laughter at one of Tregr's sly jokes . . . but not this year.  His heart was not in it.

It must be nearer the first hour than the eleventh.  Knocking back the last of the topaz liquor from his palm-cup, Veylin picked up the bottle, wondering whether he should drink more.  The mood was upon him, but it would not do to be drunk when Regin came.

A little more would make no difference.  Pouring a finger's worth into the cup, he cradled it in his hand, staring into the glowing heart of the fire.

Quiet crept back in, without.  So much so that he started at the soft tap of knuckles on the door.  "Your pardon, Veylin," Regin said, hanging in the doorway as if uncertain of his welcome.  "I did not mean to be so late."

Veylin shook his head and gestured towards the other armchair.  "I am the one requiring pardon, for shirking my duties as host.  Will you take some of my sister's spirits?"

Regin shut the door behind him, eyeing the bottle warily.  "I have heard of them.  Is that the double-distilled or the triple?"

"Triple."

"A very little then."  Regin frankly considered Veylin's wry leg, stretched out on a footstool before him.  "I do not think you are fit to carry me home.  What is that smell?" he asked, sniffing.

"Mint," Veylin told him, pouring.  "Its scent quarrels with the spirit, I know, but that is what the Lady Saelon recommended, and she is the master of herbs and healing."

Taking the cup, Regin sat down.  "Is not mustard more usual?"

There was comfort in mustard's heat, so like that of a forge, promising repair.  Promising, but it did not deliver.  "It is.  But I used so much my leg blistered as iron throws scale.  Hot water is more tempered, and the coolness of mint numbs the pain."

Regin did not answer immediately, for he had tasted Auð's liquor and was momentarily breathless.  "That is very like your sister," he pronounced huskily, when he was able.

Veylin smiled.  "I will tell her you said so."

"Only if she will take it as a compliment, pray."  Regin set his cup aside and reached for the pouch at his belt, finely tooled and studded with topaz and cairngorm.  "I begin to be curious about this uncommon friend of yours.  Here," he said, producing a folded letter and passing it over.  "Read this.  Hilmir brought it, and it worries him."

The broken seal was the color of sea-beryl, and the remaining fragment of wax bore the prow of a swan-necked ship.  "Has he read it?"

"No."  Regin took up his cup again.

Veylin angled the parchment to the light.

_ To Regin, Fifth of that name, King of the Firebeards _

_ Greetings! _

_ A fortnight before Yáviérë next, I will be at Habad-e-Mindon, which your folk call White Cliffs.  There is some question of where the border between our realms properly lies.  Should you desire to resolve this matter swiftly, I propose we meet at or near Habad-e-Mindon in the middle of Ivanneth, each bringing no more than six of our people, in order to survey the land and clearly mark our bounds.  If this is agreeable to you, I am at your service. _

_ Círdan _

_ The first day of Narbeleth, the 2850 th sun-round of the Third Age of the World _

Having read it thrice, noting the Sindarin month-names and that it was dated after Saelon should have paid her rent, Veylin passed it back.  "Would reading it reassure him?"

"I doubt it.  If anything delayed us on our way to Barazdush for next year's council, he would imagine us slain by Elves."

Veylin snorted softly and picked up his cup.  "Does it reassure you?"

Regin pensively tapped the parchment on the arm of his chair.  "I do not know.  It sounds fair."

"Have you met the Shipwright?"  Veylin guessed the ancient Elf had written the missive himself.  A scribe or counselor, most of whom originally served Gilgalad Fingon's son, would have used the Quenya names of the months, as was usual in Common Speech.  At any rate, the letter had Círdan's forthrightness.  Why was he going to White Cliffs?  Had ill befallen Saelon on her way to the Havens, or had she offended in some way that warranted formal scrutiny?

"Once, long ago, before the madness in Menegroth."  Whatever he saw as he gazed into his cup, it was not the amber liquid within.  "Fools.  All of them, fools.  Círdan is near kin to Thingol, is he not?"

Had Regin visited Menegroth?  Walked with the masons who delved it for Greymantle?  He rarely spoke of his earlier incarnations, and the annals of Belegost had been lost in the wreck of Beleriand.  "So I have always heard.  He has been just in his dealings with me, however, when he need not have been."

"It is your venture at stake here—no other's.  Would you accept this offer, and the bounds so decided?"

A year ago, it would have been hard to answer, for the fire opal he had snatched from the raging sea sang in his blood, rousing him as no woman ever had, the gem-lust more potent and besotting than any liquor Auð ever crafted.  Anything that might constrain his prospecting would have been intolerable.

Yet his prospecting had been constrained, by things more difficult to defy than the claims of Elves: his duties as chieftain; the weakness of his leg.  All year—two years, in truth, save for that one awesome strike, Saelon's gift—his desire to find stones worthy of his skill had been frustrated, and disappointment was digging into his heart, sapping the joy of his successes.  For he had successes, notable successes.  Compared to others, many others—take Grimr, or even Thorin—what grounds could he have for complaint?  Gunduzahar grew and prospered; his work was widely admired and profitably sought after; he was on good terms with his king and his nearest kin . . . .

The overall design was very well, but there was an essential lack of harmony in the composition, and the harder he labored to bring the sometimes wildly varied elements together, the more details he found flawed.  Saelon and Gwinnor: he valued them both highly, for very different qualities, as one might prize coal and marble; yet he was now on awkward terms with them both, for very different reasons.  He had more commissions than he could fill in a timely fashion, and why?  Because he did not have enough prentices sufficiently skilled to see to the rough work.

What did one do, when the most cunning work began to go awry?  One returned fundamentals, and rebuilt from there.  A fine neck-chain or belt might pass from father to son for generations, but it was better to pass on one's art.  Though he would have no sons of his body, he could still get sons in his craft.

"I would accept," he answered Regin.  "Some Elves will always consider us thieves, but those of better will begin to doubt me, and they have deepened the mistrust of the Men of the Star.  Let us have the matter clear."

That brought a frown.  "The West-Men are ungrateful, when you have slain the fiends for them and aided their kin?"

Veylin drew his hand through his beard.  "I fear Rekk and I have rebuked them for neglecting their kinswoman, and not all my counsels agreed with theirs."

Regin chuffed and shook his head.  "You should have left her to her own, Veylin."

"If she had left me to my own, I would be dead."

"You have paid that debt."  His king was curt.  "More than handsomely, I hear."

Draining his cup, Veylin warned, "Should you come to White Cliffs, Regin, beware.  The Lady Saelon is apt to give without thought of return, and some of her gifts are beyond price."

"I have also heard that the Men of White Cliffs are very poor."  Regin's eyes had narrowed.  No doubt he was wondering what she could give that was more precious than life.

"Dreadfully.  In everything save spirit."  Seeing the dubious cant of Regin's brow—did he think him drunk?—Veylin shrugged.  "If you suspect my judgment, ask Rekk, or Auð.  They, too, have been drawn in by her gifts."

Regin set aside his own cup.  "Is this meeting at White Cliffs one of those gifts?"

He had not thought of that.  Perhaps the spirits _had_ gone to his head.  "I do not know.  We spoke of her journey to the Havens at their Harvest Feast, but mainly of the roads she might take.  Her dealings with the Shipwright are her own."  He had told her he was satisfied he and Círdan would come to a settlement.  He had also told her to be patient; yet patience was not one of Saelon's gifts, not where her heart was engaged.

"I wondered why she pays him rent, when you claim the land is ours."  Regin sighed, setting his hands together and to his lips as he gazed into the fire.  "How near to the Sea is Habad-e-Mindon?"

"Not quite ten chains, though the hall sits sixty paces above the bay's plain."  He would not tell him Saelon's cave was wave-carved.  If he did, was he likely to come?

Regin and the Shipwright at White Cliffs . . . .  If this parley was set, they must do something about the wretched path up to the cliff-ledge.  It was a disgrace, marring the hall as a crude setting dimmed a fine gem, and it was not as if they wanted stone . . . .

"Ten chains!  So near as that?"  Regin rumbled, looking at him askance.  "And you are there often, you and your company?"

"Not that often.  If you dislike the sea's noise, it is muffled within the hall, and in Nordri's quarry across the little river, where you might house.  Or we could assemble at Maelchon's, behind the cliffs."

"Who is this Maelchon?"

"Their chief farmer, who supplies us with barley.  Nordri and Grani built his house."

"Hmph.  I will think on it."  Rising, Regin looked down at him.  "I will give you my decision before you leave for Gunduzahar.  When did you plan to return?"

"I do not know," Veylin said.  "I will—with your leave—go with the Broadbeams to Barazdush after Yule.  Hilmir has a kinsman whose son desires to be a gemsmith, and he has suggested I take my leg to the Smoking Spring.  I will ask Vitnir to serve on the Winter Court in my stead, but you would want me here in the spring, would you not?"

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Notes

**Clipping** : taking metal from a coin, often by cutting or shaving down the edge.  When coins were made of precious metals, this was a common and profitable form of pilferage, and a good set of scales, to detect the lighter weight of clipped coins, was a trader's only defense.  (This is why recent coins often have small ridges on their edges, so one could see that they hadn't been shaved down.)

**Pigeon's-blood rubies** : considered by many to be the finest rubies, these pure red to slightly purplish-red stones are enhanced by a natural red fluorescence.  Some simply use the term to describe rubies of a certain quality and color, but others maintain such stones only come from one locality in Burma/Myanmar.

**Khand** : the land southeast of Mordor.  This is probably analogous to the region sometimes referred to as "the 'Stans" (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, etc.).  Historically, this area was often ruled by Central Asian steppe nomads such as the Mongols, whose title for their leaders was _khan_.

**"Scatha's teeth"** : when the ancestors of the Rohirrim dwelt in Éothéod, between the north of Mirkwood and the Misty Mountains, Fram, the son of their chief, slew Scatha, the great dragon of the Grey Mountains ( _LotR_ , Appendix A.II, "The House of Eorl").  Dwarves claimed Scatha's hoard as their own, but all Fram sent them was Scatha's teeth made into a necklace, saying, "Jewels such as these you will not match in your treasuries, for they are hard to come by."  Tolkien concludes with "Some say the Dwarves slew Fram for this insult.  There was no great love between Éothéod and the Dwarves."  Echoes of this ancient quarrel may help explain the quick hostility between Éomer and Gimli at their first meeting.

**Wulf** : the son of Freca, a man who claimed Rohirrim royal descent though he had much Dunlending blood.  Freca insulted Helm Hammerhand, who refused to give his daughter in marriage to Wulf, and Helm slew Freca with a blow from his fist.  In revenge, Wulf raised an army of Dunlendings, capturing Edoras in T.A. 2758 and sitting as king in Meduseld (one of the many ill things heralding the Long Winter), before he was slain by Fréaláf, Helm's sister-son ( _LotR_ , Appendix A.II, "The House of Eorl").

**Nulukkhizdîn** : the Dwarvish name for Nargothrond, Finrod's deep-delved stronghold in First Age Beleriand.

**Mint vs. mustard** : the principal medicinal chemical in mints ( _Mentha_ spp.) is menthol, which is a potent partial anesthetic, blocking sensation except for cold, and therefore useful for pain relief.  Mustard seed (either _Brassica nigra_ , native to the Middle East, or _Sinapis alba_ , white mustard, native to the eastern Mediterranean, both late introductions into northwestern Europe, my analog for western Eriador), crushed and mixed with cold water, produces sulfur-based irritants that stimulate blood flow and therefore healing, but prolonged direct contact with the skin can be damaging.  Given Dwarves' "tough guy" values and immunity to disease, one suspects their medical practices are brusquely focused on promoting healing, with little concession to palliative measures.

**Scale** : when heated to high temperatures in the presence of oxygen, the outermost layer of iron flakes off in flecks known as scale.  A good smith carefully controls this wastage of metal.

**"the Smoking Spring"** : a hot spring, analogous to that the Romans called Aquae Sulis, which now feeds the King's Bath in the English spa town of Bath.  Taking Tolkien's equation of the Shire with the English West Midlands, and my view of Wales as Harlindon, the Spring should be south of the Brandywine (Severn) north or northeast of Eryn Vorn (Cornwall).


	14. A New Road

_ The path of duty lies in what is near, and man seeks for it in what is remote. _

—Mencius, _Works_

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Regin sat back down, staring from under his ruddy brows.  "You will not prospect this winter?"

Veylin chuffed.  "The more chances I strive to make for prospecting, the fewer I get.  Something is not propitious.  On consideration, it will be better to go south and mine the admiration your regalia has wrought.  There I know what I can justly take."

"True."  Yet it seemed something rang false, for Regin regarded him with dissatisfaction.  "The Spring is a good thought, but surely you do not mean to soak there in winter!  Why not rest your leg until the roads are better—or, if we meet with the Shipwright at White Cliffs in Yavannië, there will be time to visit the Spring before the Council.  More of the Broadbeams will see my regalia then, and you will have more commissions than you can easily fill."

"That is one of the reasons why I wish to go earlier.  I lack prentices enough for the work I have, and there is little interest here."

Regin frowned.  "Because Arðri and Vestri were slain?"

"I would prefer Firebeards myself, but would you allow your son to prentice himself to so perilous a master?"

"The fiends were a strange new evil.  Such things are difficult to guard against."

Veylin smiled dryly.  "If I had sons, I would not.  Still, I need prentices, and their fate is less well known in Barazdush.  Or perhaps I will find another Longbeard desperate enough to work for me!"

Now he was sure Regin thought he had drunk too much of Auð's strong spirits, for his king snorted in scornful dismissal.  "Durin's sons know a profitable thing when they see it, and sometimes they are wiser than our folk.  Name those you wish to take into your workshop, and I will speak on your behalf.  That may tip the balance."

"Thank you," Veylin said, sincerely grateful, and considered.  "Sterk spoke to me regarding Stigi before I first crossed the mountains, and Rekk tells me that Foss, Mosi's son, has a shrewd eye for a stone."

Regin nodded.  "If I cannot get you one of them, you have leave to prospect in Barazdush this winter."

"If you do, I cannot?" Veylin asked, stabbed by dismay.

Now Regin looked on him like a father, levity replaced by disapproving suspicion.  "There is more to this than you are saying, Veylin.  Why would you forsake Gunduzahar and Sulûnduban for Barazdush—and do not try to sell me one of your profitable schemes!  You always have two or three ready to hand."

He _had_ drunk too much.  "I do not wish to forsake Sulûnduban, my king—or Gunduzahar.  I merely think it wise to go abroad for a time."

"Share this wisdom with me," Regin invited, gone cold, "for I do not see it."

Shifting in his chair, Veylin regretted mentioning his plans, only resolved on this evening while he waited.  More ill timing, Regin's flattering confidences calling forth his own.  "It is a private matter . . . " and when that brought no clemency " . . . involving a woman . . . ."

"Veylin!" Regin exclaimed, sternness shattered by astonishment.

"No!  No," Veylin repeated emphatically, finger raised in something dangerously near admonition.

Surely his king was not fighting to suppress a smile, though his eyes were suspiciously bright.  "I think I am glad to hear it.  You have gone too far, Veylin, and yet not far enough to reassure me.  Would you earn this woman's favor, or avoid her?"

He could make this long, or he could make it short.  "It is Sút, Sire."

If there had been mirth, this slew it.  "Sút?" Regin repeated, scowling and brusque.  "What new mischief is this?"

"Nothing new—nothing since what befell at Rough Beck—"

"Befell is the word, or so I hear."

"—but I would be certain of not seeing her for a time.  We are expelling her from Gunduzahar's company and taking her share for repairs to the bridge."

"You would be fools if you did not.  Do not tell me you fear to face her anger."

"No . . ." Veylin said slowly, seeking a creditable path through this mire.  If he did fear, it was not her anger at being cast out of Gunduzahar.  "I do not know that she is angry.  We have not spoken since the day after she fell."

"Why then should you flee?  If someone must leave to prevent your meeting, it should not be you."

"I—"  Words failed him.  For all her sins, he did not wish to have Sút driven out of the mansion.  Then she would have nothing but whatever dark passions she carried in her heart; nothing left to lose.  What might she not do then?  Could that fail to stain the love between him and his sister?  But neither would he use Auð to justify his behavior.

As he desperately rummaged for an honorable reply, Regin reached for the bottle and poured himself more spirit, gazing on Veylin with dreadful patience as he drank.

Perhaps it was the strong drink; perhaps it was the late hour, after a long and trying day . . . he could find no good answer.  Was that not why he wished to go to Barazdush?  Sút, too, had accused him of fleeing, and that was what this was—the hope of finding a solution elsewhere, as a gem might be found in fresh rock, or of time resolving the problem, one way or another.  Now he saw that, like debt, trouble had only been put off and was coming due with interest.  Why did he believe this deferment would improve matters?

Veylin sat, glumly resigned, awaiting Regin's just rebuke.

"It is not often," Regin said, turning his gaze to the liquor, admiring its color in the firelight, "that I have cause to find fault with you, and never before have I doubted your courage.  Or is it only my kinswomen you find daunting?  Last time it was Safna, was it not?"

"It was, Sire."

"Hm."  Regin had Woken not thirty years before Veylin left for the Iron Hills, and was still becoming acquainted with his children's children then.  Another half century had deepened his understanding considerably.  "You profited much by your travels, to our people's benefit, but I cannot do without you for so long."

"No, Sire."

"However, since you obliged me tonight by entertaining Thorin, so my attention could be more gainfully bestowed elsewhere, I will make you an offer.  Tell me, candidly, what is between you and Sút, and I will give you leave to go until spring."

So ore must feel, when it was tried.  Veylin sighed.  "Nothing save misunderstanding, on my oath."

"Go on."

"After I drew her from the stream and brought her to the Riven House for shelter, I learned that she desired to be my spouse; a desire I cannot share.  From what was said, I believe she came to Gunduzahar to be near me and to jealously observe my relations with the Lady Saelon."

"Is the Lady so often in your halls?  Is she?" Regin pressed, when his answer was not prompt.

Gunduzahar's reputation must suffer, or Sút's, and hers was already marred.  "No, Sire.  Saelon has passed the doors but thrice.  Only two Men entered Gunduzahar this last year, and one of those a child, who brought us word of the brigands."

"Did I not hear you gave the Men a feast?"

"On the roof, yes.  Not within."

"How then could Sút observe you with the Lady?"

Veylin hesitated, seeking fit words.  "As you might guess, Sire."

Regin scowled.  "I do not know why you think leaving would spare you, then."

"I do not believe she has ever been to Barazdush, or knows the way."

His king drained his cup with a grimace.  "I should be glad the two of you did not wed!  Your children would have been dragons!"  He huffed, expression settling into something nearer what he wore in council.  "You do not know if she is angry?"

"Our last words were cold, and we kept apart the rest of the way to Sulûnduban."

"Does she speak to Auð?"

"I do not ask."

Regin turned from him to the fire, and stared into its red depths.  "Very well," he decided.  "Go to Barazdush.  I will expect you in the Spring, and we will meet the Shipwright at White Cliffs on our way to the West Council in the autumn, to settle the dispute about our bounds.  Then Veylin," he told him sternly, " _you_ must settle into some pattern that can be relied upon.  At Gunduzahar if you wish, and if your leg will suffer the journey here often enough to do your duty by your sept, but no further.  A chieftain is not a bachelor, free to follow his own desires, even if he has no wife."

Veylin bowed his head as Regin stood.  "Thank you, Sire."

"At your service.  Now, get you to bed, for I will need your wits tomorrow, when Hilmir protests the Longbeards' inroads on his people's trade with the Shire.  I do not think their custom worth so much ill-feeling, but you have been in that land, have you not?"

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

"Look!" Varði exclaimed in delight, crawling over to point at the tiles depicting an axe being tempered.  "That is just the color the iron should be!"

"Of course it is," his mother said, but she was watching her elder son walk appraisingly around the sculpture of Azaghâl and Glaurung, wrought of gold and steel.  "Do not dirty your good clothes on the floor."

Auð pressed her lips together, determined to say nothing.  Perhaps Duna's floors were dirty, but they might have eaten their Yule feast from this one, instead of off the best plates laid on the table in the hall.  Veylin had made a particular effort in his preparations, this being not only a holiday but the farewell feast for their Broadbeam guests and an offer of reconciliation to Vitnir.

A farewell feast for Veylin, too, since he would be leaving with Tregr and Brodi in two days.

"Very good, is it not?" Bakki, one of Tregr's ealdormen and Bersi's cousin, asked Vegr, joining him by the dragon's thrashing tail.

"I suppose," the lad replied, with the maddening diffidence of those approaching their twentieth year.

"Vegr!" the little one called, still admiring the mosaic's forging scene.  "May I live here with you, when this is yours?"

Duna bustled over to Varði then, taking him by the arm and lifting him up.  "Enough.  We will go home now."

"Come, Duna," Veylin said affably, moving their way with a swiftness surprising in one so lame.  Logi, Lof's son, came with a flagon at his gesture, bowing and offering to refill Duna's glass.  "It is Yule.  Do not hurry off when there is still so much wine to be drunk.  You must harden the lad to long hours."

Auð stood near enough to see the suspicion in Duna's eyes, but aware of the august audience about them, Vitnir's spouse inclined her head.  "True.  A little more, if you please," she said to Logi.

Veylin gazed benevolently down on the boy.  "You will live here sooner than that.  Would you like to see your great-grandfather's forge?"

Such a fetching child, the close curls of his beard the same rich chestnut as his father's.  "Yes, please!"

"Come, then," Veylin said, offering his hand.  "I will show you where it is hidden.  Will you come too, Vegr?"

"Very well."

Auð watched the three of them go, heart conflicted.  So Veylin had been with her lads, a charming uncle, his kindliness but lightly burdened by the discipline that was a parent's duty.  She should not be jealous for her sons' sake: they were too old for such simple pleasures, and Veylin's kindness to them was unfailing, though tempered in Thyrð's case by a master's demands.  She found she was uneasy at the thought of Veylin, with his unsound leg, on the road without one of them, for Thyrð had remained in Gunduzahar and Thyrnir must go there soon to rejoin his master.

She always said she had gone to Gunduzahar to be with her boys, but the prospect of traveling there without the assurance of Veylin's company was disagreeable.  Thyrnir had not his experience, and Rekk did not take so much care.  What road would they take, with the bridge over Rough Beck down?  What if brigands were abroad, as they were last year?  The harvest had been poor in much of Eriador and doubtless—she could not help recalling the ragged Hanadan and his prodigious appetite—some Men had been driven to desperation.

There was work enough to occupy her profitably if she remained here in Sulûnduban, Thjalfi having begged for two suits that would not be outshone by Veylin's, but she had not heard from nor seen Sút since their parting at her door, and that absence was a like a void behind a screen of stone, more haunting than the loss of Thekk.  His spirit was safe in Mahal's keeping and his body at rest in Gunduzahar, but Auð would have welcomed sure word of her friend's fate.  The nearest she could come was an elderly third cousin who left food at Sút's door and shook her head, dismally mute, when questioned, no matter what was asked.

At least she ate.  But breathing alone was not life.

Auð forced her mind from such morbid reflections.  Gunduzahar: should she return there?  The company would be dull without Veylin and Sút, though Hlin was some consolation.  Grimr's admiration was not unpleasant.  If she went, she was not likely to see Veylin again until after Midsummer, since he would come here first for the Spring council.  But if she did not go, would he feel she had taken a distaste to the delf he had fitted out especially to please her?

He had not asked whether she would stay or go.  That too brought her pain, his reserve so like his foolish guilt over Thekk's death.  Only the death of the fiends had laid that—but what resolution could they hope for here, where vengeance was not called for?

"I hope you will be glad to see us in Thrir's Hall," Vitnir said quietly, startling her from her unpleasant reverie.

"Of course!" Auð answered, heartfelt, for unlike her brother, she had always liked their cousins.  "Father would have been grieved to see it so dark and quiet, and Mother too.  It is only right that your boys should grow up here, so they love the place as much as we do."  The outer limbs, at least; Veylin had reserved the family suite, the somewhat shabby heart of the hall, for his private apartments.  Auð was glad, for Duna, ever eager to impress, would surely have swept away the venerable furnishings.

"I hope it is not too late for Vegr," Vitnir muttered, mouth set in dissatisfaction.

Auð chuckled.  "Boys are like that, at his age.  Did I not have two of them, and a younger brother?  They ache for meaningful work and we will not trust them with it, so they smoulder.  When you give him more fuel, he will flare up again."

From the lad's livelier expression when Veylin brought them back out to the gallery, the smithy of his father's fathers may have already fed the fire somewhat.  No doubt that had been Veylin's intent, but after Vitnir and Duna took their leave and the Broadbeams made their merry way towards their beds, Auð drew her brother away from Nordri and Skaði.  "Shall I say my farewells now, or might you have time to dine with me before you go?  You would be welcome at any meal."

Veylin leaned in to kiss her cheek.  "I would like that, but I cannot abandon my guests.  Would you come to breakfast the morning we depart?  It will be very early," he warned.

She smiled, hoping her regret did not show through.  "I would rather take leave now, when I have you to myself.  You will be troubled by ponies and the baggage, and Foss has not yet learned how you like things."

"He will have learned by the time we get to Barazdush," Veylin assured her.

"The new coat fits?"  He had grown stout enough that his old ones no longer did.

With a shuffle and cough, he muttered, "It is huge, Auð."

"I do not care how it looks," she replied tartly.  "The shearling will keep you warm.  Does it fit?"

"Yes."  More a grumble than gratitude, but he would thank her if the snow grew deep.

"Is there anything else I can do for you?  Before you leave, or after?"

"I would be grateful if you helped make Vitnir and his family comfortable here.  They may do as they please with the old Warder's Wing.  I have given Lof a purse they can draw on for refurbishing, but if Duna overreaches, speak to Vitnir.  He will listen to you."

Was he assuming she would remain here?  She could not restrain Duna from Gunduzahar.  "If I can."

For a breath his eyes were searching; then he glanced away to the patch of floor where Varði had been enthralled.  "I like the boys, especially the younger."

"Be more circumspect there," Auð advised.  "Duna does not like it.  She fears you will steal their hearts from her by cozening them."

Veylin arched one brow.  "They belong to Thrir's Line, and she must remember that."

"As Thyrnir and Thyrð belong to Nidr's?" Auð observed, not without wryness.  "I know you do not like her, but do not be unfeeling.  You men take our boys from us soon enough, and she has no daughter to keep by her."  Nor did she.  Who would she pass her craft on to, the knowledge their mother had entrusted her with?  To assume Thyrð or Thyrnir would wed a suitable woman was foolish.  Perhaps she too should look about for prentices, now that the boys were grown.  They would provide her with company, and occupation for mind as well as hands.

But would they come to Gunduzahar?  Would their kin allow it?

"Thyrnir and Thyrð are not in Nidr's Line, and Thjalfi has given me leave to borrow them," Veylin came swiftly back, then sobered.  "You cannot think I will neglect them.  They are the sons of my heart."

Auð punched his arm, hard enough to rock him.  "Fool!  You cannot content everyone, however hard you try."  Vitnir already begrudged the wealth that had gone into Gunduzahar, for her sons' sake, and as his sons grew older and began to look around for wives, they would begin to expect support.

"No.  But I will try," he promised, rubbing where she had hit him.

Rolling her eyes, she kissed his cheek in return.  "Take care, on the road.  I will not be happy until I see you again."

"So you always say, and then you weary my ears with all the delights I have missed when I return.  Away with you now," Veylin dismissed, waving her off.  "I must speak to those two—" Nordri and Skaði, conversing quietly over the last of the wine "—before I seek my bed, and the nights grow shorter."

Only because this had been the longest night of the year; but she turned and walked away without demur, letting him have the last word.  They understood one another well enough, deeper than any speech could ever tell.  Whatever else Sút had ruined, this was unshaken, solid as the ancient rock beneath their feet.  Wheresoever their tangled paths led, her brother would always be with her, in the secret chambers of her heart.

* † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † * † *

Notes

**Sire** : a title of address used in the past for any lord, though now especially associated with kings; literally "father."  Adaneth!Dwarves, you may have noted, although often punctilious about honorifics, rarely address each other by titles of rank.  The purpose of such titles is to acknowledge and accentuate dominance, and since Dwarves "ill endure the domination of others" ( _The Silmarillion_ , "Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age"), everyday use would be apt to rouse resistance through irritation.  How often did Thorin's companions use his title on their way to the Lonely Mountain?  Veylin's repeated use here marks his abashed submission to Regin's authority.

" **driven out of the mansion** ": Dwarves have, at least in the First Age, punished deviance with exile.  "The great Dwarves despised the Petty-dwarves, who were (it is said) the descendants of Dwarves who had left or been driven out from the Communities, being deformed or undersized, or slothful and rebellious" (HoME XI: _The War of the Jewels_ , "Quendi and Eldar," App. B. Elvish names for the Dwarves.).  This makes sense in light of their (literally) patriarchal authority, the Fathers saying, in essence, "Not in _my_ house!"  Dwarves being so stiff-necked, if filial piety and peer pressure don't persuade them to behave, what else could you do except execute them, which smacks of kinslaying?


End file.
